Impending Darkness
by o0-Key-0o
Summary: MMPR. Billy goes missing, Jason and Trini race to crack the World-Burner language. Can they crack it in time? I promise, this is a new chapter after 2 years! Chapter 13!
1. First Darkness

Disclaimer: Power Rangers and all things related belong to Haim Saban.

**Impending Darkness**

Chapter One

Billy sat up suddenly, his hands automatically raised to defend himself. A searing sensation swept over his skin, and the Blue Ranger inhaled with a sharp exclamation. Slowly he unclenched his fingers, feeling rather than seeing the angry burns on his forearms and hands. Billy fought down a wave of panic as he realized that his glasses were missing and he had no immediate way to determine his surroundings. Everything was dim and murky, as if wherever he was had little illumination at present. Billy took a quick status report of himself: burns and some moderate bruising as well as what felt like a sprained ankle. His glasses and own clothes were gone, replaced by a type of mesh tunic and pants. More disturbing was the absence of his communicator and morpher. Had he been captured?

"Somehow this situation lacks the traditional atmosphere of Zedd and Rita's lunar establishment," Billy said aloud, simply to hear some noise other than silence.

Unexpectedly, he received a reply. "Billy?" Kimberly's voice came to him tentatively, as if she was afraid she was dreaming. Billy also heard weakness, and hypothesized that Kimberly was injured as well.

"Kimberly?" Billy called back, willing his voice to sound better than he felt. He groped around him for familiar objects and quickly discerned that he was lying on some sort of narrow bed. Carefully, Billy disentangled himself from the blanket that had been covering him and got his bare feet on the floor. The surface felt spongy and wet, but he didn't let that deter him. "Kimberly, please continue to speak," he said to her, eager to locate a friend in the darkness.

"I'm over here," Kim said, a definite note of fear in her voice. "Billy, where are we?"

"I am unsure as to our current location, but no hostile movements have been directed at us yet." Billy kept moving forward, limping severely but determined. He encountered a low table, catching it in a blind grab right before it fell over.

"What was that?" Kim asked.

"In my optically challenged state, I failed to see an article of furniture in my path. Thankfully, it does not seem to have sustained any damage."

A hint of laughter crept into Kimberly's voice. "Nice to know some things don't change. So you lost your glasses?"

"It would appear so." Billy felt around with his hands to keep from hitting anything else. The dull pain in his left ankle intensified as he headed toward Kim. At last, Billy found the edge of another bed, and then a hand that gripped his reassuringly.

"Kim, are you all right?" Even if Billy couldn't see much, he could certainly hear Kimberly's unsteady breathing. Without his glasses, he could only make out a pale, blurry circle that was the Pink Ranger's face.

"It's my ribs," Kim said after a long moment. "I think a few might be broken." There was an uneasy pause before she asked, "Billy, do you remember what happened to us?"

Strangely, the thought had not crossed the young man's mind. "We were engaged in combat against Rita and Zedd's putties, as well as their new monster, Alarmo. I recall defeating the putties and Alarmo growing…" Billy trailed off. "After that I am uncertain."

"Do you think the monster did this? Alarmo didn't seem to be really strong or smart, just annoying." Kimberly recalled the thirty-two separate times she'd been woken in one night by Alarmo's pint-sized version of himself, before the Rangers had figured out what he really was.

Billy said slowly, "We might have to consider the possible hypothesis that our precise location may have no corresponding relationship to Rita and Zedd."

There was a pause. Then, "Could I have a translation?" Kimberly asked the dark room in general, managing a weak laugh.

A voice to their left answered, "He said that Rita and Zedd might have nothing to do with this."

"Trini?" Kimberly gasped. "Are you okay?"

"I think so; just some bruises," Trini replied. There was a rustling noise, and then soft footsteps approached. Trini peered at her two friends with concern. "Billy, what happened to your hands?" She touched the back of Billy's right hand gently. The fiery pain abruptly flared back to life, and Billy couldn't help wincing and pulling away.

"I believe I may have encountered some conflagration of which I have no memory," he said after the worst of the discomfort had passed.

"He said he got burned but doesn't remember how," Trini translated for Kim's benefit. "If there was more light I could see how bad it is."

"And perhaps we could determine our location," Billy added.

"And find Tommy, Jason, and Zack," Kimberly said. "It would be too weird if we're here and they're not."

Trini looked around, able to see only silhouettes and dramatic color differences, such as Billy's white shirt versus the darkness beyond him. She squinted, her almond-shaped eyes narrowing further. "I think I see another bed on the other side of you, Kim." Trini went and checked, touching the shoulder of the occupant gently. "It's Zack," she reported. "He's got a really big bump on his head, you guys. I don't know if he'll be waking up anytime soon."

"Guys?" Jason's voice came from somewhere in front and to the right of Kim's bed, from the direction Billy had originally come. "What happened—aah." Jason made a brief noise of pain even as he slid to the floor and steadied himself against the end of his own bed.

"Jason?" Trini felt her way toward him. "Are you hurt?"

"I feel like Goldar decided to play basketball with my head. That's if that winged monkey could even figure basketball out." Jason managed a laugh. "But other than that, I think it's only a few cuts and bruises."

"Tommy must be here, too," came Kim's voice. "Jase, Trini, do you see him?" Fear had worked its way back into her mind, and Kim imagined the worst for her boyfriend.

"It's hard to see anything," Jason said. "Trini, can you look for a light switch while I find Tommy?" He rubbed his temples, trying to get his throbbing head and neck to give him a break.

"Okay, but be careful," Trini warned. "If you feel dizzy, sit down before you fall down."

"I encountered a low table when I first attempted to traverse this room," Billy said, still leaning against Kim's bed, momentarily useless due to his vision.

"Trini?" Jason called over his shoulder.

"He hit a table earlier," the Asian girl said.

Jason heard just in time to avoid knocking over the mentioned obstacle. He kept one hand on the table, feeling around for any accompanying furniture. At the very end of his reach, he encountered the end of another bed. In the darkness, Jason couldn't see who it was, but Zack and Tommy were the only ones he hadn't heard from.

"Is Zack over there?" he asked in Billy and Kim's direction.

"Trini determined that he is to the right of Kimberly's position," Billy answered. "Judging from your voice, you are to the left."

"Then I have good news for you, Kim," Jason said as he touched Tommy's shoulder. "Tommy's here all right." A sudden frown crossed his face. Tommy was lying on his front, and somehow Jason doubted he had gotten there on his own. Without enough light, it was impossible to know if the White Ranger was injured.

"Tommy," Jason said, shaking his friend's shoulder. "Come on, bro." He felt Tommy move, and smiled in relief. "Man, you had me worried."

"Jason? What happened?" Jason heard movement, as if Tommy was trying to sit up. "Argh, something's wrong with my back; it feels like its burning." Jason detected an undercurrent of panic in Tommy's voice.

"Hold on, Trini's trying to find the lights," Jason said. "We'll work this out. You're not the only one that wants to know what's going on."

Tommy stopped trying to get up, more out of concern for the type of injury he had, rather than the pain. Pain could be dealt with far more easily than a spinal injury. "Is everyone here? Where's Kim?"

"She's just over there with Billy. Man, I don't know what happened to us, but it was serious. Zack's still out cold."

"I've got it!" Trini's voice carried across the room.

"Good job, Trini," Kim called. "Billy, you look terrible."

"It would seem that the unfortunate events which brought us to our present location were not designed to preserve our physical health or appearances," Billy said in reply.

"What did he say?" Zack sounded groggy, but the very fact that he was awake was enough cause to breathe a temporary sigh of relief.

"He said that we all look terrible," Trini filled in. "It's good to have you back, Zack."

In the midst of finally being reunited and being able to see one another, there was one person who was silent.

"Jase? What's wrong?" Tommy asked, raising himself slightly on one elbow to get a look at his best friend's expression. Jason's hand left Tommy's shoulder and he passed it once across his face.

"Did Trini really turn the lights on?" Jason asked quietly.

"Yes," Tommy replied cautiously. Jason's brown eyes never wavered, but his voice betrayed him.

"I can't see, bro."

_To be continued_


	2. Breaking Trust

Disclaimer: Power Rangers and all related paraphernalia belong to Haim Saban.

**Impending Darkness**

Chapter Two

All previous relief and levity had been forgotten in light of the Rangers' current problem. The only thing positive about the present situation was that the lights provided a complete picture of their mysterious surroundings. Unfortunately, there was no more information to be gained; everything was labeled in an alphabet that consisted of wavy lines and small dots. Billy held the opinion that they were being held by someone from outer space, but he hadn't used the word 'alien' precisely.

"Well, if they're peaceful, then why haven't they shown themselves?" Kimberly asked. "They could at least give us back our communicators and stuff, so we could return to the Command Center. Alpha would have us patched up in a minute."

"What if they're not peaceful?" Trini countered. "What if they're the reason everyone's hurt? I'm not sure we can trust anybody yet." She was continuing to explore every surface in the room, looking for any sort of hidden compartment. The room itself was circular, with six beds spaced evenly around its circumference, sticking out like the spokes of a wheel from gray, nondescript walls. The beds themselves seemed suspended in the air, supported only where the heads met the wall; Trini was currently poking around under Zack's bed, having found a small panel on its underside.

"We can't assume anything," Tommy said. "Whoever's holding us could be watching us right now. They could be trying to collect information about us, or Earth, or any number of things." He glanced at Jason, who was leaning against the foot of his bed, staring into space. As far as Tommy knew, he was the only one with the knowledge that Jason was blind. He wasn't sure if his best friend was still in shock, or if Jason was trying to be strong for the others by not admitting his unexpected disability. Jason was a good leader, but Tommy didn't want to see the Red Ranger take it to the extreme by pretending nothing was wrong just to keep the others' spirits up. For the moment, however, Tommy held his peace.

Trini rolled out from under Zack's bed and climbed to her feet, pulling at her white mesh tunic before rubbing her eyes. "All I've found so far is some circuitry, but I don't want to play with it yet." She steadied herself against the doorframe where she'd found the light switch. There were three doors, each positioned between two of the beds. The central door, where Trini was standing, appeared to be locked for the moment. No amount of pushing the controls beside it could make it open, and Trini had eventually given up, knowing her friends needed immediate help.

Going clockwise from the central door, Zack's bed came first. The Black Ranger was sitting up, holding something that passed as an ice pack to the bump on his head. Thankfully, Trini had managed to locate a few medical supplies. There had been a refrigerated compartment with cold compresses as well as several vials of what Trini and Billy assumed were medicine.

"Whatever you do, don't you get sick on us," Zack cautioned Trini. "You're gonna get tired trying to take care of everybody."

Trini looked at him with matronly disapproval, taking in the metal contraption around Zack's right leg which kept his broken limb immobile. "I don't know what you guys did to yourselves, but someone's got to look out for you. I just wish I could remember what happened."

"Yeah, looks like I won't be pulling cool moves anytime soon," Zack said sadly. "And you're right, I want to know who owned us. We've never been beat this badly."

"We'll figure it out," Tommy said, shifting slightly. He had decided to chance sitting up, making sure to maintain a straight posture. He looked over at Kim, who was still flat on her back with a couple cold packs resting against her left side. She caught him looking and smiled slightly, as if to say that of course they were going to get to the bottom of this. The small door between her and Zack's beds opened, revealing a bathroom of sorts, decorated in the same gray color as the room. There were some identifiable things such as a shower and toilet, but an absence of controls for said things. As the resident genius, Billy had been unanimously selected to figure everything out, provided he felt up to it. Billy had agreed, knowing that a water supply would greatly aid Trini in her attempts to help them.

Trini left the locked door alone; she'd been playing with the buttons again, and had briefly entertained a notion of prying the cover panel up to try hot-wiring her way out. "Did you find a sink somewhere in there?" she asked Billy.

"Affirmative," Billy replied. He was still squinting; none of their belongings had been located as yet, and Trini was running out of places to look. The loss of their morphers and communicators was the worst thing by far--they were alone and trapped, cut off from the two beings that could have told them what was going on.

"Can you tell me how it works?" Trini went to her bed to the right of Kimberly and picked up a stack of cloths made from the same material as their strange outfits. She followed Billy into the small triangular room and was lost to sight for a moment. The two of them held a brief conversation, right before the Yellow Ranger marched Billy to the low table in the center of the room and made him sit down on a chair she dragged over from between her and Tommy's beds. Trini sandwiched Billy's forearms and hands between cold, damp towels and propped his sprained ankle up slightly, covering it with the last of her ice packs.

The tips of Billy's ears turned slightly pink at being mothered by his teammate, but he knew it was only logical that Trini try to get all of her friends back on their feet as soon as possible.

"I've got to find a way to get aloe or some kind of burn treatment," she said, more to herself than to her patient. "Does that help at all, Billy?"

"I believe the cooler temperature is aiding in the alleviation of pain," Billy replied. The pink in his ears was spreading to his face, but he ignored it. "Thank you, Trini."

"You're welcome." Trini went back into the bathroom to wet some more towels.

Jason spoke up for the first time. "We're lucky whatever did this to us didn't take Trini out as badly." There was a general murmur of thanks in the Asian girl's direction.

"Don't speak too soon," Kimberly warned. "Whoever got us here could want any number of things."

"Kim's right, we've got to be careful," Zack said, removing his ice pack long enough to touch the bump on his head. With a sigh, he put the pack right back on again.

Tommy thumped one fist on the hard edge of his bed, venting a moment of frustration. "I feel like we need to be doing something! Talking about things won't get us out of this place."

Trini, still calm and logical, pressed a cloth gently to a large, shallow cut on Jason's forehead. His hand came up automatically to keep it in place, and he looked up in her direction, but Trini missed the way his eyes failed to focus precisely on her face. "Don't worry, Jason, I'll be right with you after I get a look at Tommy's back."

"Trini..." Tommy started to say, wanting to tell her that there was something far more seriously wrong with Jason than him. But he saw Jason's shoulders tense up, and he caught Jason's jaw tightening warningly as he turned slightly in Tommy's direction.

However, either Trini didn't hear him or chose to ignore what sounded like a protest, because she said, "Tommy, I've searched every inch of this place. Right now, the only way out is through that door, but even if it were open, most of us couldn't escape without help. It's best that we take every chance to heal." Trini's words were firm, but her expression was kind. "Do you want me to help you with your shirt?"

Tommy looked at her, trying to communicate his troubled thoughts to her dark eyes. It worked; Trini blinked and cocked her head slightly to one side. Tommy then stared pointedly at Jason's back before glancing again at Trini. Her gaze strayed to the leaning figure of her leader, who was again staring at an invisible point somewhere to the left. She nodded ever so slightly before checking to see if the others had noticed. Zack and Kim were talking quietly to one another, and Billy appeared to be attempting to scientifically dissect the control panel near the main door just by looking in its general direction, since he couldn't really see it.

"I changed my mind," Trini said, softly enough not to attract the attention of the others. "You're first, Jase."

"Hmm?" Jason looked over and then rubbed his eyes. "Really, Trini, I'm fine. I just have this horrific headache and I'm a little dizzy."

Trini looked back at Tommy as if for confirmation. Tommy shook his head and was about to mouth something, but he caught the not-so-casual posture used by a person attempting to eavesdrop without looking like it. Jason was listening for any extra noise or pause that would reveal the fact that his friends were talking about him without his knowledge. Tommy gave Trini a bare nod and moved to pull his tunic over his head.

"Okay, if you're sure..." Trini tried, but Jason was adamant.

"Yeah, don't worry."

Sighing, Trini turned her attention to Tommy, who was struggling to get the tight-fitting tunic over his head without aggravating his back too much. "Hold still a minute before you get stuck," she said, attempting to lighten the mood. "Relax your shoulders and put your chin down." Trini quickly slipped the shirt over Tommy's head and held it up for inspection the moment he got his arms free. Her sharp intake of breath made Tommy jerk his mind back to his own problems.

"What is it?" Slowly, Trini turned his tunic inside out, revealing dark, almost black splotches lining the white mesh. As if mocking him, his skin prickled suddenly, causing spasms of pain to spread across his back. Tommy gritted his teeth, wincing and willing the world to stay in focus.

"Tommy? What's wrong?" Kim's concerned voice broke into his silent struggle for control over his body's reaction. Now he was the center of attention, for those who could see him.

Trini had already moved around behind him to get her first look at the damage done. "Oh my word," she whispered, staring at the ugly lacerations striping the White Ranger's shoulders and back. "Who could have done this to you?" The wounds were partially scabbed over, but excess blood had dried around them, only adding to the gruesome-looking injuries.

By this time, Kimberly was getting agitated, and slowly began to sit up to get a better look at what was going on.

"Beautiful, don't you even think it," Tommy warned. "You're staying right there." The calm authority in his voice made Kim hesitate. She gave him a no-nonsense look.

"Then you'd better tell me everything, or so help me I will get up and look for myself."

With a grimace, Tommy held up the shirt he'd been wearing so Zack and Kimberly could see it. Even Billy squinted, and a faintly sickened look passed over his face. "Yeah, all those red stains would be a bad sign," he said for Jason and Billy's benefit.

"Is that blood? What happened man?" Zack asked, using the same question that everybody wanted an answer to.

A sharp zing of pain seemed to pass right through Tommy's back and out his front as Trini carefully began cleaning around the cuts. "Aah," Tommy complained, but otherwise kept his reaction as minimal as possible. He had an audience, and he didn't need all of them fussing over him when each clearly had their own disabilities at the moment.

"I can't be sure," Trini said from behind him, "but I think you were beaten with a whip or small switch. There are about twenty-five gashes in all."

"Let's talk about something else besides us, wishing we knew what happened, and plans for figuring out things we have no way of knowing for right now," Zack said, changing the subject. Tommy managed a small, grateful smile in his friend's direction. "I think we should have a contest."

"What manner of competition do you wish to commence?" Billy asked, shifting in his chair slightly, so as not to disturb the cold cloths on his arms.

"Worst monster you could make out of something in your room at home," Zack supplied immediately. At a few groans of protest, he insisted, "Come on, Rita and Zedd make up ridiculous monsters all the time. What if we had a chance to cause them the same kind of problem?"

"As if my dream about Mr. Ticklesneezer wasn't bad enough," Trini said, still working methodically on Tommy. "Okay, I have something. The Jadester!"

"The what?" Kimberly asked, keeping one eye fixed on her boyfriend and the other on Trini.

"I have a jade necklace from my mother," her best friend explained. "It's got a carving of Buddha on it, or something. Anyway, what if he became this big, green stone monster that attacked Rita and Zedd with his horrible Strangling Strings attack? He could choke them or something."

"Or bodycheck them aside with his huge belly," Zack said, laughing a little. "What about spells?"

Trini shrugged. "I suppose he could turn everyone into miniature jade figures, just like he had once been."

"Ow!" Tommy twisted aside as a particularly vicious stabbing sensation lanced through him.

"Oh, Tommy, I'm sorry," Trini instantly apologized. "I should have been paying more attention."

"No," Tommy said after a moment to catch his breath. "It's fine. I was enjoying imagining a six-foot Buddha turning Goldar into a miniature monkey statue."

Jason actually smiled. "It'd be the least that stupid ape deserves," he said, glancing in Tommy's direction to give the impression that he was merely staring neutrally at nothing, listening to his friend talk.

"Okay, so we have Trini's Jadester. Who's next?" Zack asked, trying to maintain the momentum of his contest. He looked around at the other five teenagers. "How about you, Billy?"

Billy straightened and swung his squinty gaze to the fuzzy outline of the Black Ranger. "I doubt very much that the portion of the house in which I spend my nocturnal hours is similar to any of yours," he said somewhat sheepishly. "I possess many sundry half-completed experiments and though I have arranged them all, I'm afraid—"

"Quit stalling and cut to the chase," Kimberly cut in with a teasing laugh. "Honestly."

The Blue Ranger ducked his head and cleared his throat; his right hand twitched beneath its cool wrappings as if it longed to push his missing glasses up the bridge of his nose. "Well, if I were to invent a nemesis to defeat Rita and Zedd, I suppose I would utilize one of my automated inventions. Currently I'm working on something to split chemical compositions into their basic elements safely. Think of the possibilities of splitting Zedd and Rita into their basic elements."

"We could call it the Splicinator," Tommy said with a grin. "Of course there'd be nothing left of those two lunar lunatics with delusions of grandeur."

"I could always attempt to modify the Splicinator to split their good sides from their evil sides," Billy said thoughtfully. "But there might be the possible anomaly of there being no good whatsoever in them…"

As Billy voiced his idea, Trini motioned for Tommy to lie on his front so she could drape more of her cold cloths on the lash marks, hoping to ease some of the dull, burning pain. She didn't want to alarm him or any of the others, but Trini was sure the cuts were infected. The skin around over three-quarters of them was red and hot to the touch, as well as oozing strangely. All in all, not good signs. Did she dare burden Tommy with the knowledge that without something to treat the infection, he would likely get very sick, very soon? Or could she hold out for something to happen, like an explanation from the people that were holding them? Trini didn't know.

"Wow, Billy," Zack was saying. "Why _don't_ you invent a monster like that? Rita and Zedd would have no idea what hit them."

"Literally," Jason deadpanned.

"Unfortunately, I lack the technical equipment and raw materials necessary to create such an adversary," Billy said, smiling at Zack's enthusiasm. "However, it would be most gratifying to convert Rita and Zedd to the side of good."

"Dream on," Kimberly said with a laugh. "Thos two'll never change." She met Trini's gaze and raised her eyebrows as a request for information about Tommy. Trini dropped her shoulders in a nonverbal sigh and shook her head slightly. _'Later,'_ she mouthed. Kim gave her a threatening look, but allowed the subject to drop for the moment.

"All right, Kim, let's hear one from you," Zack said. "But you can't use your mom's purse; we did that one already."

"Hey, it was Trini's lipstick that got made into one of the monsters," Kimberly protested. "Besides, I can't help it if our enemies have a twisted sense of humor."

"Humor had nothing to do with it," Tommy muttered. "I've never used dental floss since."

As Kim tried to think of something in her room that would make an interesting monster, Trini tapped Jason on the shoulder. "Come on Jason, it's your turn."

Jason pulled the cloth from his forehead and looked at where he supposed it would have been if he could see it. "Really, it's not that bad," he tried, but Trini would hear none of it, even if all she thought was that wrong was a few cuts and a headache.

"Jason Lee Scott, you are going to sit down and let me look at you or I will find a way to tie you down," Trini said, despite her slim size. She kept her voice low, but her words had enough iron in them to make the Red Ranger comply. He pushed himself away from the end of Tommy's bed and carefully began to retrace his steps in the direction he supposed his own bed to be in. Halfway there he ran straight into the end of Billy's bed, which was between his and Tommy's.

"Hey, you okay?" Trini asked, placing one hand on his arm. Jason fought the urge to shake her off.

"I'm just dizzy," he insisted, but the lie became more painful as he repeated it. He knew Tommy could hear him. Why hadn't he spoken up if he knew the truth? Maybe he was hoping Trini would figure it out. Jason half suspected that Tommy had tried to get Trini's attention, but maybe he'd failed. Jason bit down on a frustrated growl. He didn't want pity or their condolences. He wanted to get better, to get back to Angel Grove and pretend that he was the strong one, with everything all together. He couldn't lose it in front of his teammates; they needed him.

Whatever Trini thought or knew, she didn't let on as she guided Jason to his own bed and sat him down. "You're lucky," she said. "Most of these scratches aren't real deep, except for maybe that one on your forehead."

"It's deep enough to make me dizzy," Jason said with a forced smile. He could almost hear Trini shaking her head.

"I don't think its bad enough for that. I'm worried that you were hit in the spine or on the head." She pressed a damp cloth into his hand. "Here, clean up some of the cuts on your arms while I check you for head injuries."

Jason could feel her weight settle beside him, and then her gentle fingers started moving methodically over his scalp. He winced several times as Trini found minor contusions, but it wasn't until she reached the back of his skull that he actually yelled and pushed her away with his free hand. A thump told him she'd landed hard, but he was too busy blinking away sudden tears to pay attention.

"Jason!" Kimberly exclaimed in surprise. "What's wrong?"

He drew a shaky breath. "I—I don't know. It just felt like my head was exploding, taking my brain with it." He looked at where he thought Trini was and apologized. "I'm sorry, Trini."

It was then that he noticed the silence that had fallen completely over the room. What had happened? Had he done something to Trini accidentally? Even if he couldn't see them, Jason felt the prickle of several pairs of eyes on him.

"You…can't see, can you?" Trini asked from the other side of him, obviously not where he was looking. "Jason, why didn't you say something?"

It was like something inside of him snapped suddenly, with her soft question. "Because I don't want you to feel sorry for me! I'm no different blind than I was when I could see. We've got a lot of things to work out, and I figured we didn't need one more thing to worry about. I'm not going to hold us back, because this blindness is only _temporary._" Jason emphasized the last word, before attempting to calm himself so that he wasn't outright yelling at them.

"Bro, relax," Tommy said at last. "We're with you on this, not against you."

"Yeah," Zach piped up from Jason's left. "We've gotta trust each other, because that's the only way we're gonna succeed. Don't worry, Jason. Your eyes don't change a thing."

"You're our leader, big brother," Kim said quietly.

"And in the unlikely event that your other senses have ceased to function, you can't help but notice that the rest of your companions are in similar states of physical handicap," Billy said.

There was a long moment of tense silence in which Jason looked out at the room at large with a faint smile.

"Trini?" he, Zack, Kim, and Tommy chorused. Trini started to answer, but her own giggles interrupted whatever she was about to say. The others joined in, and the awkwardness in the room vanished.

A sudden sound cut the brief merriment short; there was a soft rushing noise, like a waterfall, and the locked door to the room split into six points that retracted into the doorframe. In less than a second, the uncomfortable silence rushed back to smother them.

"I don't believe it," Zack finally said.

_To be continued_


	3. Too Many Questions

Disclaimer: I don't own Power Rangers; I just like to play with them. Particularly Lightspeed Rescue and Mighty Morphin', but those are other stories...

**Impending Darkness**

Chapter Three

"It's a kid!" Zack exclaimed, dropping his ice pack in astonishment.

"Kid?" Jason asked, startled. He'd gotten into a defensive stance, ready to take on any manner of threat...or so he'd thought.

Billy interjected, "The size of a person does not always indicate their maturity or intelligence."

"Billy, _you_ can't see it," Zack said.

"Actually, I think _it_ is a girl, Zack," Kimberly corrected. Trini took a few steps forward, facing the newcomer, who had not moved more than a foot inside the room, sealing the door behind her.

"There is no way we got beat up by a little girl," Tommy said, levering himself up enough to get a look over his shoulder.

Trini made a silencing gesture before remembering that not everyone could see her from their current positions. She cleared her throat loudly to get everyone's attention. "All right, everybody hold it. If we're going to try to get answers, the way to do it is not to shout. Now, we're going to handle this calmly." The Yellow Ranger leveled a stern, almost commanding expression at the dark-haired child facing her.

The little girl met Trini's gaze squarely, but the blank look on her face didn't change. She was a bit higher than Trini's waist, putting her age somewhere around nine or ten in human years. She didn't look around the room at the other teenagers, as if she knew they were all incapable of threatening her. The exception was Trini, but as the young woman was nearly twice as tall, plus well-schooled in martial arts, Trini knew she could easily hold her own if the kid were to try and spring at her.

"So," Trini began as diplomatically as she could under the circumstances of being beaten up and held prisoner, "we're looking for some answers. Can you help us out?"

The girl watched Trini closely, as if she was recording everything she saw. Upon further observation, Trini noticed that she only had four fingers on each hand, and one hand appeared to be disfigured, probably by burns. Was this child a victim of this place just like the Rangers? However, the fact that she could operate the door, a door that had been previously locked, seemed to conflict with that assessment.

_"Sakal sa sho,"_ the girl answered, oblivious to Trini's careful scrutiny. _"Lemmas."_

"Well, that doesn't sound good," Jason said dryly.

"You're kidding," Kimberly said in exasperation. "The least she could do is speak English."

In spite of themselves, Zack and Tommy laughed. Billy looked confused, and Jason and Kim weren't sure which example to follow. Trini, however, remained locked in a stare contest with the strange little girl, who had not altered expression or given any sign of comprehension.

"Billy, I think she's an alien," Trini said after a moment. "If we can't talk with her, how am I supposed to get help for you guys?"

Billy squinted around Trini, seeing the black clothing the girl wore and noting her dark hair, but not much else. If she was an alien, she was close enough to human to pass as one, at least in his eyes. "The status of the situation will correct itself, Trini. And though language learning is lengthy and tedious, it can be accomplished with perseverance."

Trini watched the little girl's green eyes slide over to Billy. She pushed her untidy brown hair out of her face, revealing another jagged burn mark over her left eye, making her eyelid droop slightly. The girl pointed to her eyes and then pointed to Billy.

_"Kassa ess malsha?"_ The girl used the same rising intonation Trini had for her question.

"Translation?" Zack asked.

For once, Trini raised her hands and shrugged in surrender. "I don't know; I don't speak alien!"

"Maybe she wants to know why Billy's head is trying to swallow his eyes," Tommy said jokingly.

"How did you get that out of three little words?" Jason asked.

Tommy shrugged, then winced when the action made his shoulders hurt. "She pointed to his eyes."

Trini looked between the kid and Billy. "He's missing his glasses," she explained slowly, deliberately pronouncing each word. The girl cocked her head to one side, and Trini mimicked a pair of glasses on her face by making circles with her thumbs and forefingers.

"Guh-lass-ez?" the girl repeated. _"Sakal sa sho."_

"I'm beginning to think that means _I don't understand,_" Zack said. "Woah, wait, what's she doing?"

The alien girl (if indeed she was an alien) had slipped between Zack and Kimberly's beds and was fiddling with a control panel. Kimberly strained her neck, trying to get a glimpse of what was going on above her head. Zack too leaned to his left, watching intently.

A sudden humming noise started up, and Trini jumped aside in amazement as a large, round screen appeared in midair, obscuring her view of Billy. Billy himself was so startled that he scooted his chair backwards so fast that the ice packs fell off his ankle.

"_Kassa?"_ The girl noticed the disturbance she had caused and frowned, the only true face she'd made so far. _"Lemmas."_ She closed the panel's cover and went to the shield, grabbing hold of the lower edge of the circle and pulling it down to her height.

"Uh, Billy? What _is_ that?" Kimberly asked in a loud whisper, voicing the thoughts of everyone in the room.

Billy was nearly beside himself with excitement. If Trini hadn't been right there to push him back into his seat, he'd have been limping around the new object, trying to discover what made it tick. As it was, he was sitting on the edge of his chair, practically twitching in anticipation of studying the new technology. "I believe it is a fully-functional interactive holographic projection."

"You know, I think I actually understood him," Tommy said. He really wanted to roll over and see what was happening, but Trini would probably mother him to death for even thinking it.

"_Seribi," _the girl said to Trini, putting one finger to the bluish-gray screen and drawing some sort of figure. Her finger left a white streak behind it, almost like electronic fingerpaint. _"Seribi _guh-lass-ez, _pasfavas."_

"I think she wishes you to attempt to represent my ocular devices on the holographic image," Billy said.

"What?" Jason demanded. "I missed something." He kept his tone neutral, but inwardly Jason was railing against his loss of sight. He could only imagine that the alien girl had two heads, a tail, and green fur--but the others didn't seem that alarmed. All the same, he wished he knew what his friends were seeing. Pride, however, kept him from expanding on his frustration.

"She wants me to draw glasses on this round holographic screen she created in the middle of the room," Trini explained. She began to sketch quickly, drawing a cartoonish representation of Billy's face before adding glasses. Zack and Kimberly, the only two that could really see the image, laughed before trying to muffle the noise. Trini ignored them as she utilized gestures (eyes squinting and widening) to communicate that the Blue Ranger needed his glasses to see.

"Ah!" the girl exclaimed, but she did not smile. _"Jas sakal, mas jas sho ties assis sal."_

"...and back to square one with understanding," Zack muttered, sobering.

"_Kassa?"_

"Never mind, let's work on names," Trini said. "If I can get her to identify us, maybe she can help get medicine for all of you." She studied her drawings for a moment. "I think she gets it, but she can't help. She may not have actually taken Billy's glasses, or our morphers and communicators at all."

"Well, ask her about them anyway," Jason said a bit grumpily.

"Just a minute, I'm trying to erase my sketch," Trini said, swiping one hand against the blue-gray screen. She succeeded in making a large white smear across Cartoon Billy's face.

"_Ares,"_ the girl said. She ran her hand along the bottom curve of the screen, and the white markings vanished. _"Hasi."_

"Thanks," Trini said. "Okay, some names." She wrote Zack's name first, pointing to each letter as she pronounced, "Z-a-ck." Then she indicated Zack himself, and he tried a smile and nod. "Come on, repeat it. Zack."

"Zz-ack," the girl said, looking hard at the Black Ranger.

"So far, so good," Trini muttered. "Now in the next bed we have Kimberly." She spelled out Kim's name in large white letters. "Kim-ber-ly." Trini pointed to Kim, who was watching them warily.

"_Kassa?"_ The girl, instead of looking at Kimberly, was watching Trini's face. More specifically, she was studying her mouth. _"Resaet, pasfavas."_

Billy chanced interrupting the teachable moment. "Her dialect is very sibilant, so she may not utilize all the phonetic sounds we know."

"He said she might not know some of the sounds," Trini said, without waiting for someone to ask for a translation.

"Thank you," Kim and Jason said at the same time.

"All right, I'm teaching here. Quiet," Trini commanded with a slight smile. "Kimberly," she emphasized again.

"Kim-erlee," the girl managed. Her face finally lost some of its blankness as she tried, without success, to master the Pink Ranger's name.

"Well, there are two names she won't be able to say," Jason said. "Kimmerly and Illy."

Billy and Kim made faces at Jason, which he couldn't see and thus had no problem ignoring.

"Just stick with Kim, okay, kid?" Kimberly said to the little girl with a sigh.

"Kimmerly," the girl repeated, her frown returning.

"We can always work on 'b' later," Trini said. "Now, the empty bed there is mine." She wrote her name on the screen, pointed to the bed beside Kimberly, and then at herself. "I'm Trini."

"Tree-nee," the girl repeated dutifully.

"Okay, let's review." Trini pointed to Zack.

"Zzack." Zack grinned and waved.

Trini gestured at Kimberly. "Kimmer—Kim," the girl amended, almost as if remembering Kimberly's requesting her nickname.

"And…?" Trini pointed her herself.

"Trini."

The Yellow Ranger smiled and made as if to pat the little girl's shoulder. "Good j—"

"_San!"_ the girl all but shouted, diving out of the way of Trini's hand. _"Sa sho tous saj! San, san!"_

"What in the—?"

"What's going on?"

As fast as they could move, Tommy, Jason, and Billy were on their feet and ready to fight.

The girl had backed toward the door, her arms raised to protect her face.

"Wait, she didn't try to hurt me," Trini said. "I think I just scared her or something."

The boys paused. "You'd better be sure," Jason said warningly. "There's a lot of things we don't know about her."

"And the only thing to do about that is learn," Trini countered. "Now, everybody sit down and quit aggravating your injuries. Tommy, this means you."

"But—" Tommy tried.

"You. Bed. _Now."_ Trini's tone of voice made it perfectly clear that any argument would be ignored and she would personally make sure the arguing person stayed in bed. Once she was satisfied that everyone was obeying her, Trini turned back to the little girl, who had lowered her arms slightly and was peering cautiously at the Rangers.

"It's all right," Trini coaxed. "I'm sorry; I wasn't going to hurt you."

At her non-threatening tone, the girl dropped her arms the rest of the way and said, _"Pasfavas sakal, sal sho ties tous saj. Se ess salm sor sal. Jas asi lemmas."_

"Is she…apologizing?" Zack asked after a moment. "Maybe she was afraid of hurting _you."_

Trini shook her head, mystified. "Okay, I'm really convinced she's an alien. Let's finish our names and learn hers. And _then_ I'm getting drugs for those of you in pain."

"I appreciate that goal," Tommy said, who was once more lying on his front.

"Right with you, bro," Jason agreed.

"I believe all of us could benefit from a pharmaceutical compound to allay the various feelings of discomfort we are experiencing," Billy concurred.

Kimberly sighed. "Tri—"

"He agrees," Trini said. She was writing Tommy's name on the screen. "Okay, pay attention," she said to the girl. "Tom-my." Quickly, Trini taught the other three Rangers' names, and the girl memorized them without batting an eye. She did lose the 'b' in Billy's name, but Trini wanted to move on to more important matters: getting her hands on better medical supplies.

"What is _your_ name?" she asked the girl. Trini pointed to herself. "I'm Trini. You are…?" She gestured back to the alien child.

The girl regarded her blankly for a moment. _"San," _she said after a moment. _"Jas sa sho shas na nomas."_

"Is that her name?" Kim asked. "San?"

"Negative," Billy said. "That was the word she used to report her displeasure with Trini."

"…so you're saying it means _no?"_ Jason asked. "I'm not going to call her _no."_

"Maybe she's saying she doesn't have a name," Zack said.

"But that's silly," Kimberly retorted. "What did her parents call her? As a matter of fact, where _are_ your parents?" she asked the girl.

"Pay-rents?" The girl pronounced. _"Kassa essa _pay-rents?"

Trini pressed her hands to both sides of her face and took a deep breath. "Okay, too many people trying to talk at once! I'm trying to help here, but we're not getting anywhere!"

Jason tried to calm her down. "Trini, Kim's got a good question. Maybe her parents are in charge of this place…alien planet or ship or something. If she could get them, maybe we'd have more luck."

"You're saying they sent their kid to what? Soften us up?" Zack asked. "No offense, man, but that's reaching."

"Maybe if they know we're Power Rangers, they're figuring we won't hurt a kid," Tommy said.

"So then why is she here at all?" Zack countered. "She could have left us well enough alone."

Billy had been thinking this entire time, and he gestured to Trini, who saw the motion and came over. They held a brief discussion while Zack, Tommy, Jason, and occasionally Kimberly carried on with the topic of why the girl was there. Meanwhile, the alien girl was standing in front of the holographic blackboard, studying the letters in the Power Rangers' names, attempting to mouth the 'b' sound.

"Hey, come here," Trini called to the girl, beckoning with one hand. She looked over at the Yellow Ranger, appeared to process the meaning of her request, and then reluctantly approached. Billy smiled reassuringly at her, but she did not return the expression. She kept her arms at her sides and was careful to halt a little more than a foot away.

"Here, go like this," Trini said, standing next to the little girl and stretching out both of her hands toward Billy. "Don't worry, he doesn't bite."

"_San,"_ the girl replied, shaking her head. _"S'es salm."_

"It'll be okay," Trini told her. "He's only going to look."

"As best I can," Billy said with a small laugh.

The girl looked at Trini, then at Billy, and slowly put both of her hands forward. He bent forward a little, squinting to see clearly.

"See? Only four fingers, but no signs of there ever having been a fifth," Trini said quietly, so the other four could continue their conversation uninterrupted. "And her left hand…"

"I am almost positive that she has been exposed to high temperatures of some kind," Billy said, uncovering his own arm long enough to make a visual comparison. "It does not appear that she received adequate medical treatment at the time."

"Then that's not good news for us," Trini replied thoughtfully. "And her face?"

"I would say the same. But…there appears to be a deliberate shape to the mark on her face. Almost like a handprint."

Trini looked closer. "It would have been a very small hand, with five fingers, like ours." She exchanged glances with Billy. "A touch that burns…"

"We need to escape," Billy summed up.

Trini shot him a worried look. "Why? What are you thinking?"

"I am possessed of the almost-absolute certainty that we are all prisoners. And she is as well," Billy said.

"What? How can you be sure?"

"Observe, Trini. Zack suffered a broken limb. They were testing our body's bone strength in our limbs. Kimberly has broken ribs. They experimented with upper body damage. Tommy appears to have been beaten and the cuts are inflamed: they wanted to know how thick our skin is and how we react to poison. I have burns, apparently a favorite of theirs. Are we susceptible to great amounts of heat? Jason cannot see and obviously has a head injury of some kind. They wanted to know how head trauma affects us. Whoever has us is _experimenting,_ Trini."

Trini rocked back slightly on her feet, stunned. "And what about me? I'm not hurt too badly; a few bumps and bruises."

Billy shrugged helplessly. "My theory is not without its drawbacks, but I would say that they either needed one healthy person to interact with their messenger," and he gestured to the alien child, "or that they overlooked you."

"Well, either way is better than not being able to help you guys at all," Trini said, casting a glance over at Zack and Kim, who were arguing about something. "While they're busy chatting, I'm getting some answers." She looked at the girl, who had watched and listened to the entire conversation without reaction. "Can you give us some medicine? My friends are all hurt and could use some painkillers or something."

"Hah, I win!" Kimberly crowed. Trini and Billy looked over to see her pounding Zack's scissors with her rock in a game of Paper, Rock, Scissors. "We are _so_ not naming her Angela just because you like an Angela back in Angel Grove."

"What are you talking about?" Trini asked, almost afraid to know.

Kim raised her head enough to shoot her friend a smug grin. "We decided that our little guest needed a name other than Alien Girl. I was thinking Azalea, because that birthmark over her eye looks like one."

"You and your plants, Kim," Tommy said with a tolerant sigh.

Trini and Billy glanced at each other and silently agreed not to tell the others what their suspicions were quite yet. "All right, all right, Azalea it is," Trini said. "Let's just hope she doesn't trap you in another dimension like a certain other plant did. Now, can we get back to wounded people here?"

"Hey, I resemble that remark," Zack said. Trini favored him with a mock glare before turning back to the now-named Azalea.

"Please help us. Anything you can do," Trini said. "Here, look." She went over to Tommy and pointed at his back. _"San," _she said, hoping Azalea would understand.

"_S'es salm," _Azalea agreed seriously. _"Miyas."_ She quickly went to the head of Tommy's bed; the White Ranger blinked and pulled back at seeing her close up for the first time. Azalea ignored him and opened a hidden panel, showing Trini two identical buttons. _"Vas si voss."_

"On and off?" Trini guessed.

"_Vas,"_ Azalea repeated, pressing the first. Another holographic image appeared, this time outlining the shape Tommy exactly as he was lying on his bed. The three-dimensional image was simple: thicker white lines for the outline and smaller blue lines traced the current system displayed. As Trini watched, Azalea changed to a view of Tommy's bones, then his circulatory system, and ended up with a diagnostic view showing the cuts on his back. Trini winced as she saw the spread of infection, as well as a faint red halo that probably meant his temperature was up.

Tommy raised his head enough to peer up suspiciously at the hologram; the image also raised its head. "So how do my insides look?" he asked with a half-smile.

"Hmm," Trini said thoughtfully. "I think it says your brain is missing, but then, I'm not fluent in alien."

Across the room, Zack laughed aloud before muffling the noise. Tommy half-rolled over and glared in his general direction.

"What?" Zack asked innocently. "I can't help it if the aliens are right about you."

The friends' banter kept the room's confining atmosphere light, and the Rangers' minds off of more morbid things. Meanwhile, Azalea went to the refrigerated compartment Trini had found earlier and picked out one of the vials. She then showed Trini how to operate the latches on all the drawers and cupboards labeled in the alien alphabet, ending up at a cabinet with hypodermic needles and sterilizing swabs.

"These look like something you'd see in Angel Grove Hospital," Trini said to Zack, who was nearest.

"There is a possibility that Azalea's people or owners are studying our culture and duplicating our medical devices to see how we use them," Billy said. He shrugged when Trini and Zack stared at him. "They obviously possess the advanced technology for that holographic imaging screen, so it would be logical for their own medicine to have advanced as well."

Azalea had carefully pulled out everything she thought Trini would need, and then stood back to watch the Asian girl.

"Oh, this is not a good idea," Trini said when she saw what Azalea wanted her to do. "I have no idea what dosage he—or any of them—need. I'm not a nurse, and it's not like there's a textbook for me to look at." She tried, unsuccessfully, to read the label on the bottle, but it was in alien script.

"Hey, calm down," Jason said. "There's got to be a way to figure it out. Between you and Billy, I'm sure you could take over the world, if Rita wasn't trying to do it first."

"Man, now I know why you did bad on our last history test," Tommy teased. "The first people to try and take over the world were the Romans." His statement immediately sparked another purposefully-distracting argument about the difference between conquering the known world at the time versus the world as a planet.

While Jason and Tommy were distracted, Billy stood and limped over to Trini, who was still holding the vial and looking terrified. "Trini, if we look at the situation logically..." He was interrupted by Azalea, who made a noise to indicate she wanted their attention. _"Kassa?"_ he asked carefully, having guessed from context that it meant 'what'.

"_Miyas,"_ Azalea said, pointing to the holographic screen. There she'd written two alien characters, resembling a slightly distorted 's' and a half-triangle. Then Azalea pointed to the needle. _"Sal sakala?" _

Trini took a steadying breath and collected her wits. She took a close look at the needle she held, and then made a startling discovery. "There's alien _and_ human numbers on here!" At last, here was a Rosetta stone of sorts, providing a translation as far as numbers went. That meant that with enough perseverance, the language barrier could be crossed. However, the task at hand had to come first.

Trini went into the bathroom to wash her hands before returning and pulling on a pair of rubber gloves, just to be absolutely sure she didn't contaminate anything.

Fervently hoping that everything she'd ever seen and read was true, Trini double checked the alien symbols against the human ones, and then checked once more to be sure. Then she filled the syringe to the correct mark and set the vial aside. A shiver went through her; she personally hated needles, but she was doing this for her friends and needed to just go through the motions.

"Tommy," Azalea spoke up then, pointing to the vial. _"Sho_ Jason, Illy, Trini, Kim _si_ Trini. _Sakala?"_

"Just for Tommy. I understand," Trini said, nodding. "Okay, White Boy," she said, walking over to Tommy. "In the arm or the butt?"

"_Excuse me?!" _Tommy turned over and sat up so fast that Trini glared at him, afraid he'd reopened some of his newly-formed scabs. Zack, Billy, and Jason started laughing and then found they couldn't stop. Kim wasn't sure if she should have been offended by Trini's reference to her boyfriend's rear or amused by the deer-in-the-headlights look on his face.

"You heard me," Trini went on, keeping a straight face through sheer force of will. "Where do you want that painkiller you asked for?" She held up the needle.

Tommy tried to recover his wits, and the world hazed out of focus for a moment. "The arm," he said, shaking his head to clear it. "Honestly, Trini."

"Well, you know that some drugs can make your muscles go weird for a few hours," Zack said helpfully. "If we have to fight our way out of here in the next hour or so, you might not be able to use that arm."

Tommy rolled his eyes before making a kill gesture at Zack. "No way that long pointy thing goes anywhere near my behind. I'll fight with my teeth."

As Trini cleaned his arm and administered the shot, Azalea went around and switched on all of the Rangers' holographic biomonitors. Then, based on the diagnostic readouts, she assembled more vials and syringes. For Trini and Billy, the only two not on their beds, the biomonitors displayed a stored image from the last time they had been able to scan the Rangers.

Trini disposed of Tommy's needle safely and went on to Jason. While she was occupied, Kimberly turned to her left and tried to make sense of Trini's diagnostic readout. Even though the Pink Ranger wasn't as brainy as her best friend, she did pretty well in school and knew that what she was looking at was abnormal.

"Billy!" she whispered, just loud enough to get the Blue Ranger's attention without attracting Trini's. "Come here and look at this."

He got up and approached the image, squinting as always. As he looked, his expression slowly changed; he got even paler than he was already. "Oh _no._"

_To be continued_

_Translations of the alien (which is not a language you can study, unless you come take lessons from me, deriving from a combination of French, Spanish, and a smidge of Latin):_

_Sakal sa sho: I don't understand._

_Lemmas: Sorry._

_Kassa ess malsha: What is wrong?_

_Kassa: What?_

_Seribi: Draw/write_

_Pasfavas: Please_

_Jas sakal, mas jas sho ties assis sal: I understand, but I can't help you. (Lit. 'no can')_

_Ares: Wait/stop_

_Hasi: Okay/yes_

_Resaet, pasfavas: Repeat, please._

_San: No_

_Sa sho tous saj: Do not touch me._

_Pasfavas sakal, sal sho ties tous saj. Se ess salm sor sal. Jas asi lemmas: Please understand, you can't touch me. It is bad for you. I am sorry._

_Jas sa sho shas na nomas: I don't have a name._

_S'es salm.: It's bad._

_Miyas: Look/watch_

_Vas si voss: On and off_

_I included the translations at the end of the chapter because I want you to experience what the Rangers are going through: not being able to understand, but maybe picking up a bit of it here and there based on context. Part of reading a story is the adventure the reader experiences, and to me it's not as fun if you can't fully feel what the characters are feeling, like you're right there with them._

_That said, I hope you enjoyed the chapter and look forward to the next. Key_


	4. Building Hope

Disclaimer: The Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers and all related references are property of Haim Saban; I'm just borrowing them for now. I _promise_ that I'll give them back...eventually.

**Impending Darkness**

Chapter Four

"What are they?" Kim's voice was now so quiet it was hard for Billy to make out the words.

He opened his mouth to answer, and found that it was so dry he had to swallow before trying again. "I believe...they are lifeforms."

The four small reddish-orange dots seemed to pulsate almost mockingly as Billy and Kimberly stared at them in mute shock. Two were in the vicinity of the stomach, and the others were near the small intestine, if Billy recalled his basic anatomy correctly. He knew he was scientifically analyzing the problem because the emotional side of his brain was refusing to accept the fact that Trini...

"You're saying there are aliens inside her?" Kimberly asked, visibly sickened at the thought.

"I do not wish to say what I cannot accurately support with proof," Billy said.

Kimberly raised her head long enough to look across the room to where Trini had manhandled Jason into lying down so she and Azalea could have a better look at the back of his head. "How come she hasn't noticed it yet?" Her face turned hopeful. "Maybe whatever they are, they don't like humans. Maybe they'll die without ever being a problem."

"Maybe what will die?" Zack, while Trini's back was turned, had gotten up to figure out the bathroom for himself, using the wall to hop back and forth without putting weight on his broken leg. "What're you guys talking about?"

Kimberly's breath caught suddenly in her throat and she had difficulty forming the words. "Trini...she's got something living inside her. And...and she doesn't know it yet." She pointed to the biomonitor image suspended in the air above Trini's bed.

"Kimberly was expressing the hope that perhaps the lifeforms will not react well to our physiology and will be terminated before causing any negative physical effects," Billy explained. "However, without further information it is impossible to know what to expect."

"And you're _sure _Trini doesn't know?" Zack leaned up against Kim's bed and squeezed her shoulder gently. "Well, we'll find a way to get them out." He shrugged, making it seem like the easiest thing in the world.

"What makes you so sure?" Kim asked, blinking rapidly to keep the tears in her eyes from slipping down her face.

"Simple. I'm not going to give up, and neither are you. Now if we can get Jason and Tommy to agree, then we've got the majority vote and those suckers are going down." Kimberly couldn't help it; she smiled slightly and laughed at Zack's own personal brand of logic: illogic.

Billy turned the terrible hologram off and tried to think without those four orange things distracting him. "I believe we have two options as to what the lifeforms are: alien offspring or parasites. However," he quickly added when Kim clapped a hand over her mouth to stifle a horrified cry, "my theory is that the aliens that are holding us have a much higher body temperature than we do, though we have yet to see one. If that is the case, then it nearly eliminates the first option."

"Why?" Zack asked after taking a minute to mentally decode some of the larger words in Billy's statement. "How do you know anything about who's got us here?"

Billy thought quickly. He wasn't sure he wanted to publicize his and Trini's current belief about the six of them being experiments, but it couldn't hurt to explain the deduction he'd made about Azalea's scars. Plus, if he could get Azalea to interpret Trini's diagnostic readout, perhaps she knew of some way to dispose of the alien parasites.

"Trini," he called across the room, trying to seem nonchalant, "could I borrow Azalea for a moment?"

Trini was obviously distracted; the drug Azalea had prescribed for Jason had put him completely under, making it far easier to examine the large, bleeding knot on the back of his skull. She was going to seize the opportunity to clean up the wound, and didn't really need Azalea's help to do it. "Sure," she replied, not bothering to look over. "Azalea, would you go see Billy for a moment?"

Azalea flinched slightly at the 'b' sound and soundlessly tried to reproduce it without success. A frustrated look passed briefly over her face before disappearing entirely, leaving her expressionless, as usual. She seemed to understand the nickname the Rangers had given to her, and so glanced at Billy.

"Hey, come on over," Zack said with a friendly grin. "If you help us out, I'll teach you a game."

"Just so long as it's not freeze tag or leapfrog," Tommy said. "You might have some problems keeping up with her, Gimpy." He looked almost lazily over at Kim, Billy, and Zack. The medication he'd been given had deadened most of the pain, and now he was feeling...lazy. It was almost like everything was going by him, leaving him to just sort of float somewhere between wakefulness and sleep.

"Tommy, go back to your happy place," Zack said. "And if you see any pink elephants, just be sure not to call them Kimberly."

"Hey!" Kim objected. "If you see any black monkeys, be _sure_ to call them all Zack."

"Uh, guys?" Billy interrupted. Azalea approached them by that time, and while he appreciated Zack's propensity to lighten the mood, they all needed to be able to focus for the moment. Once he was sure he had their attention, he said, "Azalea, do this again." He stretched out his burned hands, being careful not to flex them in any way that would stretch the skin.

The little girl eyed him, almost as if she wanted to know what he was up to. _"S'es salm," _Azalea warned in the tone of voice that meant _how many times do I have to say it before you'll believe me?_

"Yes, I understand you don't want to," Billy said, bending down slightly to meet her gaze, "but please show them anyway."

Azalea slowly complied, putting out her right hand, and then her left. The difference was obvious between the pink, shiny skin and her normal color. Nevertheless, Billy showed his own hands as comparison.

"Now, I do not believe my injuries are as serious as Azalea's were. It appears that she retains only partial use of her hand, and I suspect that it is from prolonged contact, as if something grabbed her."

As if to test the theory, Zack spread the fingers of his right hand and reached for Azalea's left. She started to pull away with a cry of _"San!"_

"Woah, hey," Zack said. "I won't touch you. Promise." He compared the shape of his hand with the edge of the burn, which circled Azalea's wrist. "Look, you can see where the thumb would have been."

"I am certain if we were to look at the palm of her hand, we would see similar finger-marks," Billy said. "Also, the burn above her eye is distinctly reminiscent of a small handprint."

Azalea's bangs had fallen back over her drooping eye, but Kimberly and Zack recalled how Kim had compared it to a flower—a five-petaled flower...or the mark of a small hand.

"Maybe that's why she doesn't want us to touch her," Kim said. "She might think we'll burn her, too."

"Initially, I would have agreed with you. However, we know now that Azalea can read the medical holograms, and probably understands that our body temperature is not high enough to harm her."

Zack had been thinking. "Are you sure it wasn't from some sort of acid? Like a chemical burn?"

Billy considered for a moment before shaking his head. "Chemical burns have different characteristics than heat-induced burns. I think it is safe to assume that we are dealing with aliens of a significantly higher temperature."

"So the bottom line from this entire train of thought is that those orange things are parasites and not aliens?" Zack clarified, simply for the sake of everyone's general understanding.

"Affirmative," Billy replied. "Our bodies are not warm enough to host alien offspring, theoretically. Therefore, we might compare these parasites to such things as tapeworms or hookworms. However, the problem is discovering how to treat them and what effects they may have on Trini in the meantime."

Almost without thinking, the three of them looked in the Yellow Ranger's direction, but she was still ignorant of their hushed conversation as she carefully cleaned away dried blood from Jason's scalp.

"This is too important for her not to know about," Zack said after a pause. "She's got to be ready to meet this thing head-on."

"I don't know," Kim put in doubtfully. "She's taking care of Jason right now. Maybe we should wait for a better time."

"There's not going to be a good time to break it to her," Zack pointed out. "We've just got to do it." He paused, waiting for Billy to voice his opinion. When the Blue Ranger remained silent, he prompted, "Billy?"

"Hm? Sorry, I was thinking," Billy apologized. Suddenly he felt guilty for not telling the others of his suspicions about their captors, but he wanted more proof. He kept trying to convince himself that there was no reason to make them worry unnecessarily. "I believe we should inform her when she is unoccupied, in approximately ten minutes." That would give him time to ask Azalea if there was a treatment of some kind for the parasites.

"Fair enough," Zack said. "Do you think Azalea could help us out with these slugs?" Kimberly made a face at the reference, but was too worried about her best friend to vocalize her disgust.

"I was just thinking the same thing," Billy confessed. "Azalea, do you know how to fix this?" He turned the hologram back on and pointed to the four parasites. The little girl looked, made a face, and nodded slightly.

"_Trini shol sho menasa. Shi eysi sho sah menasa, salya disehi moras."_ Azalea saw their looks of incomprehension and made a gesture as if she were eating and then shook her head. _"San."_ She then pointed to the parasites and grabbed at one of them, as if squishing it.

"...so she's saying that if Trini doesn't eat, they'll die," Zack guessed. "But if she can't eat anything, then _Trini_ will die."

"Not necessarily," Billy said. "There may be some form of nutrients that the parasites cannot absorb and thus would be safe for Trini to eat." He shrugged. "It comes down to experimentation."

"Let's assume we do what Azalea says and tell Trini she can't eat anything. How long would it take to kill those...things?" Kimberly asked tentatively.

Zack watched as Billy attempted to interpret the question to Azalea, without much success. Eventually, she got frustrated with watching him and went to her holographic screen. Erasing the Rangers' names, Azalea took hold of the screen and pulled it over to the bed. _"Seribi, pasfavas," _she said, pointing to the blank surface.

Billy gladly sketched a solar system, using arrows to indicate the rotation of the planet around the sun and a stick figure to show the planet was inhabited. Following that, he demonstrated day and night, at last coming to the measurement of one full cycle.

"_Jas sakal,"_ Azalea said with a nod. _"Komas muis _days _siu salya morashi?"_ She used Billy's English word and then made the motion of crushing one of the holographic parasites again. She looked at the picture for a moment. _"Osc-hes." _Azalea held up both hands, and made fists. Then she opened all eight fingers once, clenched her hands again, and held up six. Since the fingers on her left hand didn't unbend all the way, it took Billy a moment to understand.

"Fourteen days," he summed up, repeating the gesture with his own fingers. Azalea had to stop and count, due to the basic anatomical differences that meant ten-and-four versus eight-and-six.

"Two weeks? That's a long time, you guys, even if we start now," Kim said.

Zack sighed. "We don't have a choice. The last thing we want is to put Trini through this, but if Azalea's right, it's her best shot. The sooner we start, the sooner it'll be done and over with."

"Illy," Azalea said, attempting to get Billy's attention. _"Pasfavas rysa'a Trini quis."_ She pointed to Trini and then patted the Asian girl's bed, pointing to the hologram at the same time.

"You would like to perform another scan," Billy guessed. He knew he and the others couldn't prevent Trini from seeing the results for herself, but he also knew that as her friends, they had the obligation to inform her first.

"Hey Trini," Zack called before Billy could do so, "You almost finished over there? We think we have a problem."

"Actually, we _know_ there's a problem," Kimberly muttered so Trini couldn't hear.

Trini's head went up, a worried expression etched on her features. "What is it? What's wrong?"

"Just...come over here," Zack said, looking suddenly nervous. "There's something you need to see."

"And something we must inform you about," Billy added. He nearly jumped when a hand grabbed his arm, causing his skin to ignite with a fresh burning sensation. However, Billy was quick to assist Kimberly, who was attempting to sit up for the first time.

"Woah, hey, Kim. What're you doing?" Zack asked, hopping closer to steady her.

Kim's eyes were squeezed shut, and she kept her lips pressed together to keep from making any sounds that would give away the blazing pain in her side. She didn't even have enough breath to answer Zack, focusing instead on staying as straight as possible as she struggled to get her body to a ninety-degree angle.

"Kimberly Ann Hart, you stop that this minute!" Trini yelled from across the room, noticing the panicked expressions on the Black and Blue Rangers' faces. "So help me if you hurt yourself even more—"

"Trini...you're my best friend," Kim ground out as she scooted backward to lean against the panel passing for a headboard. She exhaled, wincing. It took her several seconds to muster the breath to speak again. "Please don't...take this the wrong way...but shut up."

With one last quick check of Jason, Trini dashed across the room, taking a brief second to level a _what-the-heck-are-you-doing-out-of-bed-buster? _glare at Zack, who had the presence of mind to look semi-repentant. "Kim, what's wrong?"

Kimberly's hand tightened around Billy's almost unconsciously, needing support from her friends as she spoke the awful words. _"You're_ what's wrong, Trini."

A brief look of incomprehension crossed Trini's face, but Kimberly rushed on, needing to get everything out in the open. "There are parasites and they're...they're living inside you. Azalea says that there's a way to kill them, but you'd have to quit eating for two weeks." Her brown eyes begged Trini to understand.

The air seemed to thicken to the consistency of molasses as Trini stared back at her best friend, waiting for what she'd heard to make sense. Then she deliberately swung her gaze to the biomonitor hologram hovering above her bed. She didn't need to ask for clarification; she'd heard it correctly and the proof was right in front of her.

Her three friends were silent, waiting for her to say something; to do something. Finally, and with an effort that seemed impossible, Trini blinked and the world seemed to drop back into normal time.

"Okay."

None of them moved. Trini tried again. "Okay, I'll do whatever it takes."

Zack was the first one to twitch. "But, fourteen days—"

"—will come one day at a time," Trini said, cutting him off. "That's not as long as it's going to take for all of you to heal."

"Trini, this is not a matter to be taken lightly," Billy cautioned, afraid the Yellow Ranger had missed the severity of her situation.

Trini laughed grimly. "I know, Billy. There are a lot of things here that are out of my control, but eating is not one of them. Another is that I have five people with me who will stop at nothing to make sure I get through this."

Kim relaxed her grip on Billy's hand and forced away the tears that had been gathering in the corners of her eyes. "You've got that right," she said, adding momentum to Trini's hope.

Zack smiled suddenly and offered his hand, as they had done before in the Command Center in times where their hope had carried them through. "There's nothing gonna stop us." Kimberly instantly added her hand, nodding her agreement. Billy carefully extended his hand, glancing at Trini's fuzzy outline.

"We are all present in this situation together." He touched the top of Kim's hand, right before the light press of Trini's hand came to rest on his burned skin. Remembering his injury, Trini pulled back slightly, but the confidence in her voice did not falter.

"We're going to beat these people, whoever they are and whatever their game is. You can't mess with just one Power Ranger, because we're here for each other, and that's one thing that will never change, alien slugs or not."

Oblivious to the full meaning of the four humans' words, Azalea was standing stock-still outside of the circle of friends, watching them as a man dying of thirst watches someone holding a canteen. Forgetting about the scan, she turned and went to the door, pausing once but not looking back. Only one pair of sleepy eyes noticed her departure, and Tommy finished falling asleep before it occurred to him to mention it.

_To be continued_

_Translations:_

_S'es salm: It's bad._

_San: No_

_Trini shol sho menasa: Trini should not eat._

_Shi eysi sho sah menasa, salya disehi moras: If she does not eat, they will die._

_Seribi, pasfavas: Draw/write, please._

_Jas sakal: I understand._

_Komas muis _days _siu salya morashi: How many days until they die_

_Osc-hes: Fourteen (lit. Eight-six, since Azalea's numbering system is based on eights, not tens.)_

_Pasfavas rysa'a Trini quis: Please bring Trini here._

_Author's Note: Please see the previous chapter for the explanation of why these translations appear at the end of the chapter instead of within._

And now a preview of coming attractions:

_As soon as Azalea was through the door and it had irised shut behind her, Jason and Tommy pounced, each taking an arm._

"San!" _Azalea cried, pulling backwards and digging her boots into the soft floor. _"Kassa asih sal sawia? Lus saj ves!"

"_Now you listen," Jason said as he and Tommy lifted and plunked her forcefully on the nearest bed. "What have you done with Kim and Trini?"_

_Azalea tried to wriggle free, but they were far larger than she, and holding her arms too tightly. Her dark eyes were large, and for once her face had an expression—fear._

"Sakal sa sho!" _she tried. _"Pasfavas lus ves; sal disea wosi hasam."

"_Oh no, I'm not falling for that," Tommy said, brown eyes blazing with anger. "You _do_ understand, and I'm tired of your lies!"_

"_Jason, Tommy! Leave her alone," Billy said, pulling himself to his feet._


	5. Losing Red

Disclaimer: The Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers belong to Saban and its related companies. I am making absolutely no money off of this story, much as I would like to. I do, however, own full rights to Azalea, her language, and the unidentified aliens holding our heroes prisoner. Trust me, I'm really only proud of the first two.

**Impending Darkness**

Chapter Five

Predictably, it was Trini that noticed Azalea's absence first. "Where did she go?" She moved to the center of the room and turned in a slow circle, but there was really no place to hide in the round room, other than the two bathrooms. Both were empty, and as Trini passed by the central door, she tried the previously-useless control panel beside it. At her touch, the door irised open, the six points retracting into the frame as before.

"Azalea must have forgotten to lock the door when she left," Zack mused, hopping around the end of his bed to get a better look. Trini glared at him, and the Black Ranger stopped in his tracks, backed up, and obediently climbed back onto his bed.

"That's better," Trini said in a mock-threatening voice. "You stay here while I investigate; Billy, I'll let you guard the door in case something weird happens." She faced the darkness of the new space beyond the door and instinctively groped for a switch on the inside wall. She was rewarded with a flood of light, making her squint slightly. Then a slow smile spread across her features. "You guys are not going to believe this."

"What?" Kimberly demanded, torn between trying to lean forward to see and remaining relatively-pain free by keeping her spine straight. "What is it?"

Trini's voice carried back to them through the doorway. "It's a kitchen and living room area...I think." There was the click of a few latches, then the rattling of what sounded like plastic containers. Then Trini returned to the room, holding an armload of grapefruit-sized bubbles.

"What are those?" Zack asked, raising a skeptical eyebrow. "Wait, don't tell me, alien food."

In response, Trini tossed one of the bubbles to him and then gave one each to Billy and Kimberly. "These were in the kitchen cupboards, for lack of a better word. They're not labeled in English, but there are arrows on them." She held up her own bubble experimentally, trying to peer through the milky-white plastic at the contents.

Billy examined the bubble he held, his scientific mind working on the method used to store sustenance in such a manner. "These could be similar to military rations, like MREs. If that's the case, then whatever's inside is likely for alien consumption."

Kimberly was running her fingers over the alien markings, examining the surface for buttons or anything helpful. She located a seam running around the circumference of the bubble, and small depressions at the top and bottom. Curious, Kim pressed both at the same time. The bubble suddenly lit up and began to vibrate, causing Kim to drop it in her lap with a yelp of surprise.

"What did you do?" Trini asked as the bubble dimmed and returned to normal. Kim poked it cautiously before picking it up again and experimentally twisting the top and bottom halves. As she had half-expected, the seam around the middle split, and an all-too familiar smell filled the room.

"_No way,"_ Zack breathed reverentially. "McDonald's. There is something seriously wrong with that."

The four of them stared at the french fries and chicken nuggets inside the bottom half of the bubble, unsure of what to do.

"It could be a mass hallucination," Billy suggested after a long moment. "Perhaps we are subconsciously producing an image of food we understand and desire."

"There's just one problem," Kimberly said. "If this was all about _my _desire, it'd be a salad instead of grease."

"Hey, I'll eat it," Zack immediately volunteered. Kim passed him the circular container without further comment, and the Black Ranger tested a fry. When he didn't turn purple and expire, the other three relaxed slightly.

"Well?" Trini asked after watching Zack eat two more fries. "Poison or genuine?" She wasn't absolutely sure, but how much poison could the aliens fit into three fries anyway?

"Nah, these are the real deal. All that's missing is the ketchup!" Zack exclaimed. He stopped chewing for a second as if something had occurred to him. "Wait a second, just how would aliens get their hands on Mickey D's?"

Trini exchanged a long, significant glance with Billy before speaking up. "Billy and I had a theory about that...what if the aliens are studying our culture? You saw the medical supplies. They're probably providing us with food that they think we normally eat."

"So what? They could still have put stuff in it," Kimberly insisted. "Not that I think grease and saturated fat qualify as good ingredients, but at least they're not weird."

Billy sighed. "We do not possess the luxury of a choice in this matter. We must eat eventually." He cast a sudden, apologetic glance at Trini, but she waved the comment aside. "Assuming that the aliens mean to study us," and here he deliberately left out the word _experiment,_ "then it would be of little benefit to kill us through our food supply."

Zack looked between Billy and Trini. "Uh...what?"

"He means it would be dumb of the aliens to kill off their observees when we haven't been here very long," Trini translated. "And pretty much, if this is all there is, then you can't be picky."

"Who's being picky?" Zack said, nibbling on a chicken nugget. "This is _way_ better than alien oatmeal or something."

"Kimberly, what method did you use to open the container?" Billy asked.

She shrugged and picked up Zack's abandoned ball. "Simple. Push the buttons on the top and bottom at the same time, wait for it to stop shaking, and twist." Kim demonstrated, and was rewarded with spaghetti and meatballs.

Billy followed Kim's instructions and wound up with a Caesar salad, which he gladly traded to the Pink Ranger for the spaghetti. Trini located some forks, and while her three conscious friends had their first meal in alien captivity, she continued to investigate the new room.

The room was the same size and shape of the infirmary, divided in half by a strip of gray carpeting. The kitchen half of the room was to the left, containing several cupboards full of the strange plastic globes, as well as small round glasses for holding liquids, presumably. Trini opened all the cupboards one at a time, hoping to discover where their captors had put the drinks they'd scrounged from Earth, if they had at all.

It appeared the aliens had taken samples from every culture, judging by the variety of eating implements in one drawer. Trini could only assume the food was the same way, but looking at the extensive quantity of containers, she was sure everyone could find something they liked.

She kept going, and came to a panel similar to the one she'd seen in the bathroom that hid the faucet from view. Trini depressed the symbol Billy had shown her, and the panel retracted to reveal a sink, along with a series of buttons. On a hunch, Trini grabbed a glass and tried the first button. Cold water spilled into the glass, and she tested it warily. _Tastes normal enough,_ Trini thought. The second button produced milk, the third orange juice, the fourth soda, and the fifth lukewarm coffee.

"Well, at least we have choices," Trini said to nobody in particular. She ventured back to the doorway and called, "Hey guys, do you want something to drink?"

Zack was tossing the last of his fries into the air and catching them in his mouth. As soon as he swallowed, he asked, "Does that mean you've got more than just water?"

Trini grinned at the hopeful expression on his face. "Water, juice, milk, soda, and coffee that I wouldn't drink if I were you."

"What's wrong with water?" Kimberly asked Zack, skewering a crouton. "I mean, I'd really like one of Ernie's smoothies, but it looks like they didn't make the top drink list."

"Milk is acceptable," Billy said, concentrating on keeping his spaghetti on the blurry fork in his hand.

"Man, are you guys kidding? Soda is the only thing that goes with McDonald's," Zack said.

Trini rolled her eyes as she summed up, "A water, a milk, and a soda. I'll let you know if I locate dessert." She went to fill three glasses as requested, handed them out, and then took Zack's empty container. She waited for Billy and Kim to finish up before retreating to the kitchen with the dirty dishes. Setting them aside for the moment, Trini turned her attention to the living room half, which had a semi-circle couch and a few padded chairs. The couch hugged the curve of the wall, and the three chairs faced it, almost forming a council-like area. Everything was upholstered in the same gray color as the walls, and Trini located nothing out of the ordinary behind any other hidden panels. Of course, that didn't mean that there weren't any; it just meant she hadn't found them yet. Azalea could probably tell her if she was missing anything.

Speaking of Azalea…Trini eyed the door at the opposite end of the gray carpet strip that divided the room in half. Had the little girl locked that one behind her this time? It was identical to its now-open twin, right down to the control panel. Hesitantly, Trini fiddled with a few of the buttons, only to find that access was denied. Great.

Trini tried pushing on the door where she figured it would be weakest: the point at which all six retracting panels met in the center. Then she snatched her hand back in surprise; the surface was warm, as if the space on the other side was hotter than usual. _That would fit with the aliens having higher body temperatures than us,_ Trini thought. _They'd need a warmer climate to live in. I'll have to mention it to Billy later._

Her stomach was beginning to demand food, especially now that she'd seen what was inside the plastic bubbles. Trini helped herself to a glass of water—about the only thing she could do to keep the hunger pangs at bay. They weren't too bad yet; she'd gone without food for a day or so at least once before. _But there's a big difference between one day and two weeks,_ a distant part of her mind said mockingly.

Trini stared at the blank, gray wall in front of her, trying very hard to maintain her composure. She had to think about something other than herself. What were the six of them going to do? Could they escape at all?

She sighed and pressed the heels of her hands to her eyes. She'd never realized how difficult it was to be helpless, not since she'd become a Power Ranger. Sure, Rita and Goldar had cooked up some schemes that had temporarily put them out of commission, but something had always happened to give them the victory in the end. And when it came right down to it, hitting the problem with the Power Sword usually solved it. Here, there was no one to strike but Azalea, and it didn't seem likely that the small girl was out to hurt them.

"Trini? Are you functioning nominally?" Billy asked. Trini jumped and glanced sideways; how long had he been standing in the doorway?

"Yes, I'm fine," she answered after a moment. "I was just thinking about how the Power Rangers typically solve problems, and what we're limited to now. We don't even have Zordon and Alpha to help us or tell us what we're facing. And on top of that, who's keeping Rita and her goons in line? If we escape, there might be no Angel Grove left to go back to, much less the world." Trini set her empty glass down and sighed.

"I understand your feelings," Billy said after letting a moment of silence pass. "It is also my desire to escape from this facility, but I am possessed of the certainty that we are capable of doing so as mere humans, and not superheroes." Billy moved into the room and sat on the nearest chair. "If we fail to have hope now, then all future attempts at freedom will be unsuccessful."

"I know," Trini replied, standing up fully and clearing away the empty bubbles into a disposal bin. She washed the silverware as best she could as she tried to think of a way to express her sense of the overwhelming odds they were facing. "It's just that it seems like there's not a whole lot we'll be able to do, even when everyone else gets better."

"There are still many things we do not understand or comprehend," Billy answered. "Azalea demonstrated that today. What we learn tomorrow may be the thing that helps us escape."

Trini rubbed her eyes. "If only we could speak normally with Azalea—there's probably a whole lot of things she could tell us." She was suddenly tired and didn't want to think anymore. She was afraid of where her thoughts would take her as their captivity progressed.

"Then that will be what we shall endeavor to accomplish when we see Azalea next," Billy said calmly. He knew he wasn't entirely capable of gauging emotions, but he sensed that Trini was just now realizing the daunting burden she'd accepted for her friends. She had set herself up as their strength in the absence of Jason or Tommy because she alone had been uninjured. To know now that she was just as weak as the rest of them while still having to be strong...

"Why do you suppose Azalea had this room locked in the first place?" Trini asked, with a change of subject so abrupt Billy felt as if he had struck a mental wall in his failure to follow.

"Perhaps she did not want us to disperse ourselves until she could perform an initial observation," Billy guessed after a moment of mental adjustment.

That didn't make sense to Trini. "But there must be cameras or sensors. Couldn't Azalea see us from there?"

Billy relaxed his eyes; they were aching from squinting too much. "That's if Azalea has access to such a system. The aliens may not share all their data with her. It also might be wise to consider the theory that we may not be the first people to inhabit these rooms."

"Which means what?" Trini asked slowly.

The Blue Ranger shrugged. "These chambers may have been altered to accommodate us. Stocking the food and drinks, for example. This room simply may not have been ready."

Of course there was a perfectly logical answer. For an instant, she'd thought there had been a darker meaning behind Billy's words. Trini felt momentarily dense, but shook it off. She had no time to feel sorry for herself. "Then what do you think is behind that door that's not ready yet?" Trini pointed to the door at the other end of the room. "All I know is that it's warm when you touch it, and Azalea _did_ remember to lock it."

Billy thought for a moment. "In all likelihood, that is the door that leads to the central area of this facility, where the aliens likely carry out their daily activities. Unless we have been mistaken in our previous assumptions, I would say that this is the extent of our freedom." He let his head hang for a brief instant as he tried to order his thoughts. "However, with no hostile action being taken against us, my theories are significantly weakened. In addition, we have yet to discern a purpose for the theoretical experimentation."

"Isn't the fact that they're aliens its own reason? In all sci-fi films that's all we ever do to each other. A spaceship crashes and the government experiments on the survivors, or people from Earth get abducted by aliens for the same thing."

"Actually, the traditional motif is to experiment on the dead extraterrestrials," Billy corrected, "but I understand your meaning. However, movies are fictitious and their logic is often unsound. We require proof to substantiate anything."

"The more they keep us in the dark, the less chance we have of figuring out a way to escape," Trini said, more to herself than Billy.

"Trini!" Zack called from the other room, cutting into the conversation.

Trini nearly spilled the remainder of her water in her haste to get back to the infirmary. "What—Kim!" Her question turned into a shout when she saw her best friend halfway out of bed.

Kimberly immediately went on the defensive. "Hey, I'm just going to use the bathroom. I can do that much by myself." Her face contorted suddenly as she shifted all her weight to her arms and dropped to the floor. Trini was quick to grab Kim's shoulders as the shorter girl landed off-balance and nearly fell.

"You are so stubborn," Trini told her best friend resignedly.

"You know it," Kim replied, straightening slowly. "Now show me how to use everything before I accidentally eject us all into space."

Zack laughed. "I can see it now. Jason and Tommy wake up as we shoot past Jupiter and we have to tell them you were just trying to wash your hands."

Kimberly rolled her eyes as Billy reentered the room just in time to catch Zack's comment. He then proceeded to explain to the Black Ranger just why the vacuum of space wouldn't let them make it as far as Jupiter, especially since they couldn't morph into their suits to protect them. This provided the girls with enough of a distraction to disappear. When Trini returned, it was to find Billy making a rough sketch on Azalea's screen, detailing the various levels of atmosphere around the earth, complete with a couple different UFOs for example purposes.

"Billy, Billy!" Zack finally complained. "I got the point. And anyway, we're not sure we're on a ship at all. It could be another planet or even dimension."

"As if Rita hasn't pulled _that_ trick enough," Trini muttered, easing herself into the empty chair by the table in the center of the room.

"Ugh, my hair is such a mess," Kimberly groaned as she came back into the room. "But I've got to say, it's great to be walking around instead of lying flat on my back. Or front, in Tommy's case." The four of them looked over at Tommy and Jason, still under the influence of their sedative medication. "I almost feel like following their example," Kimberly said with a hint of envy. "I hate being inactive, you know?"

"Kim, if you were to even try anything requiring activity, I'd have to stop you," Trini warned. "And believe me, I can get creative."

The Pink Ranger made a face, which quickly vanished as a pained expression crossed Trini's features. "What is it? What's wrong?"

Trini swallowed hard and shrugged. "Nothing; my stomach hurts, is all." It wasn't a lie, exactly. It was more of an understatement, since it felt like four hot irons were boring holes right through her.

There was a brief pause as the other three exchanged glances. Then Zack said, "You're _such_ a bad liar. Take it from a professional."

"A professional bad liar?" Trini stalled. Maybe if she got some more water, she could get rid of the burning feeling.

"No, a professional _good_ liar," Zack corrected. "Get on your bed, _now."_

"Yeah, even I caught that attempt at a subject change," Kimberly said. "Azalea wanted to do another scan in the first place, and it's about time we listened to her. Go on." She made a threatening motion that left no illusion in Trini's mind that if she didn't obey, Kim would see that she'd regret it for a long time.

Still, she couldn't bring herself to do as her friends ordered. It wasn't that she lacked the strength, but the will. Knowing about something when you couldn't feel the effects was different than when you couldn't deny it anymore. The old biomonitor image hadn't bothered her when she had felt fine. A new scan would just show her something she didn't want to see.

Trini tried to get a grip on herself. She needed to be strong and just do it. _Hope,_ she thought, recalling Billy's earlier words. _I've got to hold on to hope._ She jumped slightly when a hand touched her shoulder.

Billy had noticed Trini's lengthy hesitation. He was acquainted with the feelings his friend was facing; the feelings he had when a fight with Rita's forces went badly for him because of his less-than-superior defenses, or the sensation that struck him when it was up to him to save Angel Grove with an invention and the device simply wouldn't come together. He recalled how the other Rangers would stand behind him in the Power Chamber and pace, asking him for updates every five minutes because there was nothing they could do. It was the feeling of helplessness, of knowing that everything could spiral out of his control with the flip of a switch.

Trini turned her face up to his, and Billy was sure he could make out tears standing in her eyes. He remembered what he had always known during those times, but had wanted to hear repeated aloud. "I am beside you; I will share in your fear, and in your success when you defeat this."

Wordlessly, Trini touched his hand gently. As firmly as he dared, Billy grasped her hand and helped her to stand. Zack and Kimberly were watching silently, concern etched on their faces. Kim reached out for Trini's other hand, and her best friend accepted it. She allowed herself to be guided to her own bed and climbed up slowly. Trini stared fixedly at the empty space above her, where she knew the holographic image would appear.

Kimberly and Billy exchanged glances from either side of Trini before Billy located the biomonitor switch. "Are you prepared?" he asked the Asian girl. Trini closed her eyes, took a deep breath, and nodded.

Billy flipped the switch.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

The lights in the infirmary room had been shut off an hour or so before; it was difficult to know without a clock. All had been quiet since the four conscious Rangers had decided to call it an evening and to try to sleep.

Zack, usually one of the first people on Earth to fall asleep, was lying awake, staring at the blackness above him. He was wrestling with a vague feeling of guilt, along with a great deal of worry. The guilt was due to his relatively minor injury, compared with Jason, Tommy, and Trini. Here he was, stuck in an alien hospital bed, forced to watch the others try to handle things by themselves.

He'd hated seeing Trini's new scan; the parasites had perforated the walls of the closest internal organ and were now inside her digestive system. They were also slightly larger in size, but Billy had theorized privately to him and Kimberly that they had only managed to absorb the very last nutrients and would not grow again as long as Trini ate nothing.

A muffled moan came from somewhere to his left; it sounded like Tommy. Zack knew the White Ranger sometimes had violent dreams brought on by inner frustration; there had been one particular sleep-over study session that hand almost ended in a trip to the emergency room for both him and Jason. Billy had managed to dump a can of soda over Tommy's head before pinning him. It was Zack's mom's extensive medical supply collection that had saved the day in the end; a finger splint and four butterfly closures later, the four boys had gone back to bed.

Well, Tommy was quiet again for the moment. Hopefully he wouldn't get too deep into his sleep cycle and end up falling out of bed. Zack sighed and went back to staring at nothing and worrying about their situation.

Suddenly a display panel on the wall to his right made Zack squint; at the same time, Tommy let out an incoherent shout. Zack bolted upright in bed, but then found he could move no further. He could only sit and stare as the lights across the room darkened to an ominous shade of orange. He tried to remember what was over there, on that particular section of wall...

Zack looked around wildly as the realization hit him: the lights were over Jason's bed. Azalea must have set up some sort of alert system in case his condition didn't improve. Maybe he could wake up one of the others...

He turned to the bed on his left. "Kim! Kimberly, wake up!" The faint form of the Pink Ranger didn't move.

"Trini, Billy! We've got problems!" Zack tried to wrench himself free, but it was as if he'd been glued to the surface beneath him. He could hear Tommy thrashing around on his bed, and Zack knew that he could very well hurt himself if someone didn't stop him.

The infirmary door opened, and Zack almost sighed in relief. It had to be Azalea, alerted by Jason's alarm. Sure enough, the alien girl's small silhouette dashed through the door and went straight to the display. Then Zack gaped as three tall, cloaked figures followed her in. In the dim lighting, it was impossible to know what these beings were, but if they weren't the Rangers' alien captors, then Zack was sure he was looking at some sort of dream basketball team. Each figure was at least six feet tall, if not more.

The three aliens gathered around Jason's bed as Azalea started talking with a speed that made Zack give up on translating immediately. She gestured several times and pointed to a couple different indecipherable words on the readout.

"Azalea, what's happening?" Zack demanded, trying to get the little girl's attention. "What's wrong with Jason?"

One of the cloaked figures turned to face him, and Zack fought down a wave of sudden fear as he realized he could see nothing beneath the hood. The alien approached his bed and did something at the end. A tingling sensation rushed over him, and Zack inexplicably began to feel very heavy. Almost without thinking, he lay back down, and then found he couldn't sit up again. He turned his head as far as he could in order to see what was going on.

There was a hissing noise, followed by a _chunk_ as if something mechanical had just happened. Zack saw two of the aliens leave the room, followed by a long, floating slab. _Jason—they're taking him somewhere else!_ Zack thought. The last alien followed the bed out, and then Azalea went after it. Zack tried to call out to her again, but his voice refused to work. That was why he hadn't heard Tommy cry out or move in the time it had taken the aliens to make off with Jason; he couldn't.

Zack's eyes remained fixed on the dimly-illuminated ceiling, glaring silently at the ruddy orange color that had signaled the departure of his friend and leader. _If they hurt him, this room will not be enough to hold us,_ he thought with grim certainty. _You can't mess with just one of us. You'll learn that the hard way._

_To be continued_

_Author's Note: This is not intended to be a Billy/Trini fic; Billy happens to be the guy with enough mobility to keep up with Trini at the moment. I am merely trying to express the Rangers' support of one another, which I believe was obvious in the show itself, from what I've seen of it._

_There should be more Azalea in the next chapter, for those of you wondering how she fits into this entire puzzle._


	6. Questioning Answers

Disclaimer: Yes! I thought up _Power Rangers _all by myself! Especially the really, really cute ones! (This has been a brief sanity check. If you believed me, you failed. Congrats, join the club!)

**Impending Darkness**

Chapter Six

_Hot..._ It felt like little flaming monsters were dancing on his back, digging their claws into his skin and spreading fire everywhere. Tommy struggled to open his eyes, just enough so that he could get someone's attention. Maybe they could throw water on him and put out the blaze on his back. His eyelids, however, seemed to weigh as much as his tigerzord, and Tommy couldn't budge them.

The demons were growing more frenzied; Tommy was sure that their fire would consume him if he didn't hurry. He could feel himself jerking and twitching uncontrollably, but still no one seemed to notice. He tried to speak, but the words emerged half-formed. "He-help...s-some..."

"Tommy? Man, you're awake this time?" Zack's voice carried to him, and Tommy forced himself to try and answer.

"Y-yeah. Hot—f-fire." It felt like every word cost him an enormous amount of energy, draining him of the will to fight the monsters all over him.

Zack's voice grew even more worried. "Sounds like you've got a fever, bro. I can't get up; the aliens must've stuck us to our beds somehow. When they came in to get Jason, they even turned up the setting so I couldn't move _at all."_ There was the brief sound of grunting, as if Zack was trying to physically wrench himself free of whatever force was holding him down, without success.

A chilling sensation suddenly ran through Tommy, interrupting the searing pain for a split second. No one could help him. The icy tingling was pure panic, and it made the White Ranger go cold. Fire and ice, pain and panic.

"Tommy? Tommy, man, don't quit on me," Zack said. "Keep talking. Maybe Azalea and the aliens know what's going on and are coming right now."

_He sounds far away,_ Tommy thought, unable to resist any longer. _Maybe I'm leaving...but where am I going?_

"Man, say somethi—" Zack's faint words cut off completely, but Tommy hardly noticed. Someone had come to get him, and the door must have shut him off from Zack and the others. Tommy started to feel lighter, and the fire on his back seemed to recede slightly.

Then something touched his irritated skin—several somethings, and the agony exploded anew. Tommy cringed and cried out, but no one answered. The cold panic he'd felt before started to emerge again, but it vanished suddenly as a new feeling came over him. It was the shapeless silver-blue shroud of sleep; the curious nothing-and-everything sense one passed through to and from the place where dreams were.

Somehow, Tommy sensed that the feeling had been sent to him; he didn't know how, but as a tendril of the silver-blue fog drifted toward him, the pain fled. _Come,_ he sensed. _Come and let it fade. _So he drifted into oblivious slumber, the shapeless mist encompassing him.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Kimberly peered through the faceplate of her helmet, waving the smoke around her away. She hadn't missed the explosion less than two hundred yards away, and she _definitely_ noticed the large tremor that almost made her fall over.

"Kim, get out of there!" Jason's voice carried to her and she immediately turned and ran toward him, no questions asked. Two seconds later, Alarmo's gigantic foot left a crater where she'd been standing. Kimberly tucked herself into a forward roll and came up in time to see Zedd and Rita appear on the nearest cliff, safely out of the path of the battle.

"Now, Alarmo!" Zedd roared. "Use your time-bombs and finish those pesky Power Brats!"

"He came all the way down here to say that?" Trini was obviously a little more than annoyed; after all, she was the one Kimberly had called at 3:32 a.m. when Alarmo had kept ringing all night long.

And then, inexplicably, the scene ground to a halt. The part of Kimberly's brain that had figured out this was a dream suddenly clicked on. Her memory had stopped here...everything after this point was simply not there.

_No!_ Kim thought furiously. _There has to be a way to remember!_ She turned her head, looked at the other five frozen Rangers, and forced herself to do what she knew came next.

"It's time for the power of thunder!"

Silence greeted her for a brief moment, and then Tommy's voice rang out, "Tigerzord, power up!" And with that, everything snapped back into real time.

"Mastodon Lion Thunderzord power!"

Kimberly's exultant laugh almost made her mispronounce her own phrase: "Pterodactyl Firebird Thunderzord power!"

"Triceratops Unicorn Thunderzord power!"

"Saber-Tooth Tiger Griffin Thunderzord power!"

"Tyrannosaurus Red Dragon Thunderzord power!"

However, their zords were not what appeared next. Something huge—a spaceship that cast a shadow over all of Angel Grove—appeared as suddenly as if someone had flipped a switch.

"Wow, what advanced stealth technology," Billy said, momentarily distracted from their enemies. But even Rita and Zedd were staring upward in silent confusion. Alarmo, who hadn't moved from his threatening stance, seemed to be frozen in amazement. And then, he vanished in an orange flash of light, leaving Kim's real alarm clock sitting crookedly in a small indentation in the dirt.

"Aagh, what happened?" Rita screeched, but for once Zedd didn't berate her.

"I have seen that kind of ship before," Zedd said in a subdued tone, as if he wasn't even listening to his wife carry on about how their plan had been foiled.

The Rangers exchanged puzzled glances; Tommy and Jason had enough forethought to recall the zords temporarily. Trini and Zack, on the other hand, were trying to contact Zordon. And the spaceship loomed in the sky overhead, casting a shadow of foreboding over the city. People that had taken to safe zones when the monster alarms had gone off began to emerge and point up at the monstrous craft.

"_Trini, you and—ers mu—te—or—" _Zordon's voice crackled through Trini's communicator before breaking up completely. Trini and Zack quickly looked at Billy.

"The ship could be emitting an energy field that is disrupting our communication link," the Blue Ranger said. "It is also possible we may not be able to teleport."

Meanwhile, Rita was still pestering Zedd. "Zeddie, what's wrong?" Rita demanded, poking her husband with her wand. He turned to her, his usual rage replaced with something else. Fear? Panic? Kimberly couldn't tell; it wasn't as if Zedd's face really changed expression.

"We are leaving. Pack your things and we'll go on that honeymoon you've always wanted."

Rita, however, would not be so easily sidetracked. "But what about our plans for world domination? What about teaching the Ranger's a lesson? What about—"

"Do you see that ship?" Zedd shouted, pointing with his staff. "Those are the World Burners, Rita! In as little as a week this whole planet will be dead, pyroformed, and colonized by those aliens!" Zedd's apoplectic fury and impatience shut his wife up.

"Zordon, _come in!"_ Jason's tone of voice implied that if _Zedd_ was scared, then they were all in trouble.

"So long, Power Pests!" Zedd roared. "Even if I can't have Earth, at least I know you can't save it!" With that, he and Rita vanished.

"_**No!"**_ Kimberly woke suddenly and pressed one hand to her aching side. Her heart was racing and she was panting like she'd run a marathon.

Across the room, something she couldn't see clearly moved. The lights were still off, but she heard a noise, a sort of clunking sound.

"Kim? You okay?" Trini's sleepy question made Kimberly straighten up and try to slow her breathing. If she spoke and Trini heard anything that could be labeled as wrong... Well, Trini was Trini, the great mother hen of them all.

"Yeah, I think it was just a dream," Kim whispered reassuringly, unsure if she should share it. Yet thinking back on it, it didn't feel like a dream. It fit too well into the gap in her memory; the details were too precise and everything made logical sense.

Someone stirred across the room, drawing her attention. Billy sat up and rubbed his eyes before rising and heading for the bathroom between his and Jason's beds...

Kimberly blinked. Jason's bed wasn't there. "Trini, where's Jason?" She tried to keep her voice as calm and quiet as possible, even though she was bordering on flipping out.

"Hm?" Trini sounded like she'd fallen asleep again. "Jason? Is he in the next room?"

"His entire _bed_ is gone," Kim said uneasily, swinging her legs over the edge of her own bed and sliding gently to the floor. She didn't want to wake everyone else just yet; without his sight Jason could have gotten turned around fairly easily. _Of course that doesn't explain why his bed is missing,_ a traitorous part of her mind told her.

A search didn't turn up the missing Red Ranger. By the time Kim had checked everywhere she could think of, Trini had gotten up as well and was questioning a still-sleepy Billy. He'd heard nothing during the night, just like the girls.

"Zack, wake up," Kim begged, shaking his shoulder. As soon as he showed signs of life, she darted over to Tommy. "Tommy, we need your help."

Trini flipped the lights on, making everyone squint. "Jason's gone, you guys. We've got to find him."

"I know," Zack said, taking them all by surprise. "Azalea and three aliens came in sometime in the middle of the night." He described what he had seen and heard.

When he'd finished, Billy asked, "So you're saying that the aliens adhered us to our sleeping surfaces?"

"Yeah, and I think it's got two, maybe three settings. The first just sticks whatever part of you is on the bed down, like when I was just sitting there. The second setting pulls all of you down. I mean, that one alien put me flat with the push of a button." Zack waved vaguely at the end of the bed, where Trini located a well-disguised control panel. Zack continued, "And maybe there's another setting that just knocks you out, because when Tommy went delirious awhile later, something took me out mid-sentence. I was _gone."_

Everyone looked over at Tommy, who was sitting up and looking right back at them. His head was still a little fuzzy; usually it took him two snooze alarms and fifteen minutes to get out of bed. "Yeah, things last night got a little rough."

"'Rough?'" Zack repeated. "You had a fever or something. You thought you were on fire."

"It sure felt that way," Tommy replied a little defensively. He decided not to mention how he'd thought fire demons or something were hosting a party on his back. "But something happened. I think the aliens came and got me or something, because someone touched me and put me under. At least, that's what I remember." It was hard to describe, but Tommy was sure that some_one_ had touched him, and not some_thing._

"Did you see the aliens come in?" Trini asked, pressing her hand to Tommy's forehead. His fever, however bad it had been during the night, was gone. In fact, he seemed almost normal.

"No, I just thought they did because Zack stopped talking so suddenly."

"Did you hear this sound?" Billy opened the door of the room, producing a waterfall-like noise.

Tommy shook his head. "Maybe I imagined the whole thing."

"You couldn't have," Trini said from behind him. "This is unbelievable. Not only is the infection gone, but all of the cuts are already half-healed."

"No way," Kimberly said, taking a look for herself. "Wow."

"No wonder I feel fine," Tommy said. "Somebody had to have helped me." He rolled his shoulders slowly, enjoying the freedom of movement.

"Perhaps we have an ally somewhere in this facility," Billy suggested. "Someone with access to more powerful technology."

"Do you think Azalea did it?" Kim asked slowly.

"No, I saw her leave with Jason," Zack relplied. "She probably stayed with him to help the aliens. I mean, she's the only one that's observed us closely. It makes sense that they'd keep her around."

"We might just escape this place yet," Trini said with a faint smile.

"'Course we will. We're the Power Rangers," Tommy said. "I'm just worried about Jason."

"Zack, did the aliens look at his last scan?" Trini asked, moving to the empty space where Jason's bed had been.

"I don't know; I couldn't see everything," he replied. "And it really didn't help when one of 'em turned up the gravity on me." When Billy raised an eyebrow, Zack explained, "It felt like I got heavier all of a sudden. And once I was down, there was no getting up again."

Trini had turned on the hologram and was looking through the different systems in search of the diagnostic view. Hopefully the device had been taking readings right up until the alarm had gone off. When she found it, however, her heart sank. "You guys, look."

The holographic representation of Jason's skull was a deep, angry red. "Billy, what does that mean?" Trini asked, taking a half-step backwards as if afraid her proximity would affect the reading.

Billy peered at the image for a long moment, studying the initial wound on the back of the skull before hazarding a guess. "It would appear that the intercranial pressure resulting from Jason's injury reached a critical point and our captors felt the need to intervene."

"Intervene how?" Kimberly asked fearfully, skipping a translation of Billy's vocabulary.

"The logical option is surgery," Billy began, but hastened to add, "However, the aliens' advanced technology might not require that."

A watery sound from the next room drew their attention. Billy, Kimberly, Trini, and Tommy all rushed to the doorway, hoping for the return of their friend. Instead, Azalea came through the door alone.

"Guys, who is it? Is it Jason?" Zack demanded, craning his neck to see.

"No, it's just Azalea," Kim said in disappointment, her shoulders sagging slightly. Then she winced and straightened her posture.

Azalea, for her part, looked as if she hadn't slept at all. Her hair was untidy and there were circles under her eyes. She stopped in her tracks when she saw four of the Rangers waiting for her in the doorway of the infirmary. She eyed them warily, as if trying to gauge their emotions.

"Hold on, guys. Stay here and let me talk to her." Trini carefully approached the little girl and sat down on the chair nearest her. "Azalea, where is Jason?"

Azalea glanced once at Billy, Kim, and Tommy before returning her attention to Trini. "Jason _asih omiwia."_ She pantomimed sleeping. _"Eys asih suto hy. Salya asihi miyaswia sye. Salya disehi rysahi sye quis kies salya asihi shal eys asih uyo im vursa."_ Azalea pointed to her head and made a motion as if she were performing some sort of procedure, and then finished and pantomimed sleeping again. _"Eys asih suto."_

Trini made a few motions of her own to clarify. She pretended to be in pain, to which Azalea quickly responded, _"San. Eys asih suto."_ When Trini straightened, smiled, and looked alert, Azalea nodded. _"Hasi."_

"Okay, what just happened?" Kimberly asked.

"She's saying Jason's all right," Trini assured her. "He's sleeping, it sounds like. I'm not sure what the rest meant, but he might be in a recovery room or something."

The others relaxed slightly. When they saw their friend with their own eyes, they would truly stop worrying, but Azalea's report helped a little.

Realizing there was nothing more they could do for the time being, the Rangers tried to find semi-normal things to keep themselves busy. Kimberly immediately laid claim to one of the showers. Billy won Paper, Rock, Scissors over Zack and Trini, but was beaten by Tommy in regards to the second shower.

"Well, who wants breakfast while those two are using up all the hot water?" Trini asked wryly. She moved into the kitchen and helped herself to a glass of water. She felt better this morning; hungry, but without the pain of yesterday night. She wasn't sure how long that status would last, so Trini was determined to help as much as she could in that time. Zack and Billy answered her affirmatively, and she went to work.

While the Yellow Ranger was occupied with finding breakfast-related food, Azalea entered the infirmary and went over to Billy. _"Quis,"_ she said, sliding something out of the sleeve of her shirt. _"Lau_ glass-ez." Azalea offered them to Billy, who took his glasses and examined them.

"Thank you," Billy said in surprise, putting them on and looking at the room in focus for the first time. He couldn't wait to start studying the alien technology and script; there was so much he could learn in this one room alone. But Billy forced himself to turn the scientific portion of his brain off for a few seconds. Maybe Azalea had seen their other things, too. A communicator would be invaluable in this situation.

"Azalea," he pressed, "did you get one of our communicators?" He indicated a wristband with a round object on it to her, but she shook her head.

"_San, sosh asihi lalismyi saci. Jas scol sho wosi aylas."_ Azalea went to one of the supply cupboards and locked it, then tugged on the latch as if she were trying to get it open. She shook her head and yawned suddenly, a yawn that revealed a black and pink splotched tongue. Azalea quickly covered her mouth and apologized. _"Lemmas."_

_Fascinating, _Billy thought. _Another anatomical difference._ He asked, "Azalea, what happened to your people? Your family?"

"_Kassa? Ares."_ Azalea zipped across the room and turned her holographic screen on, ignoring a dozing Zack. She pulled the screen with her and pointed to it. _"Seribi."_

Billy paused for a moment. _"Seribi," _he repeated. It had a 'b' sound in it, the only one he'd ever heard Azalea pronounce correctly. Azalea looked at him as if to say, _No, __**you're**__the one that's drawing, not me._

"_Seri__**b**__i, _**B**illy," he tried, writing his name and how he thought the alien word was spelled. "It's the same sound."

"_Seribi _B-illy," Azalea repeated slowly. "B-Billy. Kim-berly. _Hasi! Jas sakal!"_ She smiled suddenly, but then her eyes widened in horror and she quickly wiped the expression off her face. _"Yasima, _B-illy," she said formally.

"You're welcome," Billy answered with a smile of his own, but Azalea's split second of emotion didn't repeat. Perhaps she was afraid that showing her feelings was a weakness. Azalea was watching him, her dark eyes inscrutable. Billy shook his unease off. At least now he would know she was talking to him the first time she said his name, not the second or third.

Reminding himself of why the screen was here, Billy erased the words he'd written. He started sketching a planet inhabited by stick-people, including six representatives for himself and the other Rangers. "Our planet is called Earth," he said, writing two names beside the picture. "My people are called humans." Billy pointed to each name in turn.

Azalea looked at both new words and repeated them. "Earth. Humans. _Jas sakal._"

Billy wiped the image and drew a second planet with a single figure on it. He wrote 'Azalea' above the lone person and asked, "What about you?" He pointed to Azalea and then to the picture. Maybe she was a survivor from another type of space-traveling species that was still out there. Maybe there were many races of aliens in this facility, kind of like the Federation from _Star Trek._ But what Azalea drew next contradicted all his theories.

Quickly, with stiff, exact strokes, Azalea sketched the missing people. She made several towns, a few villages, and even what might have been a camp, judging from the lack of buildings. Not only that, it was Azalea's camp; she had drawn it around the figure of her. _"Eys Saetmai,"_ she said, indicating the world. _"Eys Sylmai,"_ she said next, pointing to the people.

Then her finger went to the space above the planet. The next thing Billy knew, an enormous spaceship appeared, taking up the entire top curve of the screen. And then Azalea began crossing out the people. She scratched out the large towns first, then the villages...and finally, her camp. Every single thing she had drawn had been blotted out in seconds.

Too stunned to say anything, Billy looked at Azalea's blank face. Her dark eyes bored into his, as if to say, _**That**__ is what happened._ No tears, no anger, just the truth. A shiver went down Billy's spine. How much had Azalea actually witnessed firsthand? Why had her life been spared? Were the aliens on this ship the same ones that had killed her people? Instead of getting answers, he'd raised even more questions.

One thing Billy _did_ know: the Rangers, more than ever, were in dangerous territory.

_To be continued_

_Language Translations:_

_Jason_ _asih omiwia: Jason is sleeping._

_Eys asih suto hy. Salya asihi miyaswia sye: He is better now. They are watching him._

_Salya disehi rysahi sye quis kies salya asihi shal eys asih uyo im vursa: They will bring him here when they are sure he is out of danger._

_San. Eys asih suto: No. He is better._

_Hasi: Yes._

_Quis. Lau__glass-ez: Here. Your glasses._

_San, sosh asihi lalismyi saci. Jas scol sho wosi aylas: No, those are locked away. I could not get them._

_Lemmas: Sorry._

_Kassa? Ares: What? Wait._

_Seribi: Draw/write._

_Hasi! Jas sakal: Yes! I understand!_

_Yasima: Thanks._

_Jas sakal: I understand._

A big thanks to my friend DeviousNevius who previewed the chapter for me and gave it her stamp of approval.

_Next time on Power Rangers!_

What happened to Jason? Will Kimberly tell the others about her dream? Was there really a friendly visitor in the Rangers' room that night? Be sure to stay tuned!


	7. Planning Escape

Disclaimer: I can't even afford to buy a MMPR morpher off of Ebay; believe me, I've tried. Why would you assume that they're mine?

**Impending Darkness**

Chapter Seven

The darkness was nothing new. Jason didn't welcome it, but it was beyond his power to chase it away or let any light in. He couldn't use any martial art technique against this enemy, the blindness that taunted him. He'd avoided sharing his frustration with the other Rangers out of pride; Jason didn't want their help. So they'd talked around him, forgetting that he didn't have the use of his eyes and making visual references to everything.

At the time, Jason had wanted to be overlooked, but Tommy and Trini hadn't left well enough alone. Now Jason wished he'd listened better when the others had been exploring the room. From the near-silence around him, he guessed that the others were sleeping.

But no...the sound of this room was different. There was no faint hum of background noise, and the absence of sound made him feel like he had a pillow over his head.

Cautiously, Jason raised his head, recalling the pounding headache he'd had before Trini had knocked him out. At the first movement, it was as if his sense of touch switched on, and Jason realized that he was not lying on anything. He moved one hand in a slow circle, but it encountered nothing solid. Instead, there was a rushing, liquid-like resistance.

Quickly, Jason touched his face, only to discover a strange filmy membrane over his nose and mouth. _The aliens turned me into a fish!_ He threw aside his first irrational thought and continued to feel out his surroundings. As near as Jason could tell, he was suspended in a pool or tank of some sort. He couldn't reach the sides from where he was, and didn't want to risk losing his air supply when he couldn't see what was around him. The liquid felt the same as water, however, so for the moment Jason assumed that was what it was.

Almost as an afterthought, he carefully probed the head injury Trini had found, steeling himself. There was a small bump and a general ache that started up as if it had been waiting for him to think about it. However, no dizziness or spike of agony accompanied his poking. So the aliens had done something to heal him up, but not return his sight. _This has got to be their version of a hospital room,_ he thought sarcastically. _A fish bowl._

A ripple passed through the water suddenly, like someone had picked up the fish bowl. Jason tensed and a new feeling of terrified helplessness swept over him; he was trapped with no sense of direction and nothing to cue him on how to escape. The next thing he knew, he was sinking gently. Jason's near-weightlessness slowly left him as the water level dropped. He forced himself to remain still, reaching out for any surface to give him an idea of bearing.

Then his right knee touched a smooth, curved wall, and Jason pressed his hands to it. The remainder of the water drained away, and he wiped excess moisture from his face, careful to leave the strange membrane alone.

Almost like it had sensed his thought, the wet, almost slimy mask slipped off and Jason coughed as warm, humid air took the place of whatever he'd been breathing before. A familiar voice came to him.

"Jason, _asia sal hasi? Jas asimi sho shal sei Liame-Menashi swol assisa, nais sal asia suto."_ Azalea's language made no sense to Jason as he got to his feet carefully, hands outstretched to ward off any unseen aliens or objects.

"Azalea," he said slowly, cutting through her chatter, "I can't understand you. Please, take me back to my friends."

"_Sakal sa sho," _Azalea said doubtfully. Jason figured she was standing a few feet away in front of him, out of arm's reach. _Probably so I don't touch her by accident,_ Jason thought, recalling the girl's earlier reaction to Trini.

"My friends," he repeated firmly. "Zack, Kimberly, Trini, Billy, and Tommy."

"Freh-ends?" Azalea imitated. _"Jas sakal. Jas dise prens sal."_ A small hand took hold of the hem of Jason's wet shirt and Azalea tugged gently. "Not touch," she said distinctly. _"San."_

Had she understood what he'd wanted? Jason couldn't be sure. Any type of hand gestures wouldn't help him.

"Jason? _S'es hasi. _Come, _s'es hasi."_ Jason recognized Azalea's tone: reassurance. Taking a deep breath, Jason followed.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

In the time it took for Kimberly to emerge satisfied from her shower, Billy and Zack had taken their separate turns in what was quickly becoming thought of as 'the boys' bathroom.' It wasn't the lack of proper shampoo or conditioner that had made Kim take so long, however. She'd been trying to remember more from her dream-memory.

It was horrible enough knowing what Zedd thought about their chances. But surely Zordon had had some advice or knowledge or even some new weapon that could help them. However, Kim hadn't remembered anything more.

She toweled off and pulled on a fresh tunic and pair of pants, which she'd found in a small cabinet. The strange mesh material fitted itself to her body, giving Kimberly the sense that it was its own type of device. Did it have dual purposes? Maybe it was super-absorbent, like a form of cloth bandage, or something.

Kim pushed her distracting fashion-analyst thoughts aide and twisted her damp hair up on top of her head. With nothing to secure it, the strands fell right back into her face. Sighing, Kimberly hung up her towel and made sure the bathroom was relatively clean before opening the door.

"Hah, I win! Three of a kind beats two pair!" Trini exclaimed, holding up what was unmistakably a hand of homemade playing cards. Zack and Tommy groaned before throwing down their own cards and adding a fork each to the large pile of bubble-halves and random eating utensils.

"Um...what are you doing?" Kim asked, afraid to know. Obviously, she'd missed something while she'd been sorting out her thoughts under hot water.

"We're playing five-card draw with a twist," Zack explained.

"Yeah, professional gamblers, that's us," Tommy said with a grin. He and Trini had pulled the small table from the center of the room over to Zack's bed, along with a couple of chairs.

"Where's Billy?" Kimberly asked, hoping to find someone still sane. Now that he had his glasses back, she'd assumed he'd be trying to take the nearest piece of alien technology apart, but Billy was nowhere in sight.

Zack jerked his thumb toward the open doorway connecting the infirmary to the kitchen area. "Azalea had to ask permission for paper and pens over some kind of computer link. Billy's going to try to find some files telling us what happened before we got here."

Kimberly shifted uncomfortably. "About that...I had a dream last night that I'm sure was a piece of our missing memories."

Suddenly the random poker game was forgotten as the other three gave Kim their undivided attention. Trini darted into the next room briefly, and Billy emerged a moment later.

"This could answer some of our questions," Tommy said eagerly, but sobered when he saw the doubtful look on Kim's face. He took one of her hands and squeezed it gently. "Go ahead, tell us what you remember."

Slowly Kimberly recounted the battle with Alarmo and how it had culminated in calling in the 'zords. When she mentioned the appearance of the spaceship, Billy visibly stiffened, but said nothing.

"And then Zedd took one look at that thing and told Rita to pack up because there was nothing they could do to stop the aliens. He called them the World-Burners, and I kinda got the feeling he'd seen them before. He said that Earth would be—" and here Kim had to stop and swallow, but her voice shook all the same, "—would be dead, pyroformed, and taken over by the aliens." She shrugged helplessly. "That's when I woke up."

The others were silent, considering the implications of what they'd just heard. "There has to be more," Tommy said finally. "We didn't all end up injured in that fight."

Kim pulled her hand out of his in order to twist both in frustration. "I _know_ there is! It's like when you're trying to remember a word and it's on the tip of your tongue but you still can't say it."

"Then you sit up at two in the morning and wake everybody in the house up when you shout it," Zack said. "My family's always doing that with song lyrics."

"And I did it last night," Kim said. "I woke Trini up."

"I just thought you were having a nightmare," Trini confessed. By now she was watching the still-silent Blue Ranger. "What is it, Billy?" She asked after a long moment, unable to ignore her friend's dismayed expression.

"It's something Azalea told me," Billy said, pushing his glasses up his nose. "I asked her about her home planet." He explained what had happened with the holographic screen.

"They've got to be the same alien dudes," Zack said. "It's too much of a coincidence."

"And if they are the same, then how long do we have before they attack Earth?" Tommy mused aloud. He made a frustrated noise. "What are we doing here, then? Is it because we're the Power Rangers?"

"Well, Zedd doesn't know everything," Kimberly said slowly. "And there's got to be more that I haven't remembered yet."

"Billy, have you been able to do much with the computer link?" Trini asked. "There may be some kind of archive that explains what the World-Burners do to planets."

Billy sighed. "Nothing to report as yet," he replied. "I'm hoping when Azalea returns we may decipher the script and language of the interface."

Kimberly blinked and looked around. "Where _is_ Azalea anyway?"

"She departed quite suddenly, but I couldn't determine the cause. She was working with the computer link at the time, so she may have received some sort of message," Billy said.

As if on cue, the now-familiar sound of the door in the next room reached their ears. Kimberly and Tommy, closest to the connecting doorway, turned to look over their shoulders. Then Kim was running, and the name that filled the stunned silence behind her brought the rest of the Rangers to their feet, including Zack.

"_Jason!"_ In a moment they were all crowding through the small doorway to welcome their friend and leader. Jason stood perfectly still, Azalea still holding a fistful of his shirt. The little girl looked at the five oncoming teenagers, looked up at Jason, and quickly got out of the way.

"Hey Kim," Jason said with a faintly-embarrassed grin as the petite Pink Ranger seized him in a tight hug. He returned the embrace in his big brother way, appreciating the familiarity of human touch. It was then that Jason realized it was better to have the support and strength of your friends to fall back on than to face things alone.

Questions came at him from all directions as various backslaps, handshakes, and hugs went around.

"What happened?"

"How are you doing?"

"Did you see an alien?"

Jason felt his grin widen and he laughed. "If I didn't know better, I'd say you guys were worried about me."

"Now _that's_ the Jason I know," Zack answered. "How's your eyes?"

"I still can't see," Jason admitted. At their meaningful silence in which he was sure they were all trading glances with each other, he said, "Guys, don't worry. Whatever the aliens or whoever did, I'm better." He related all that had happened, ending with Azalea bringing him back.

"It is possible that your vision may return gradually," Billy remarked. "It may only be a matter of time."

"Are you hungry?" Trini asked. "There's a lot to catch you up on. Plus, Zack should sit down or else." She directed a glare in the Black Ranger's direction.

Looking slightly taken aback by Trini's threat, Zack plunked himself in the nearest chair and put his leg up on another.

"Yeah, breakfast sounds great," Jason said. Then he paused and asked a bit awkwardly, "Uh, Kim?"

"Come on, big guy," Kimberly said, smiling. She took his arm and led him to an empty seat beside Zack. "Hey Trini, think you could find me something, too?"

"Two instant meals coming right up," Trini replied. She crossed to the kitchen half of the room and began shaking some of the meal bubbles experimentally, listening for the rattling sound associated with cereal.

"Azalea, wait," Billy said suddenly. A few of the other Rangers turned to see the small girl preparing to leave. When she found she was the center of attention, Azalea quickly keyed in something on the door's control panel and let her hand fall.

"_Kassa?"_ she asked, stifling a yawn with her hand.

_She looks so tired,_ Billy thought. _And there is a high probability that she hasn't eaten recently, either._ He really wanted to take a crack at understanding the alien script, but it would be no good if his interpreter couldn't focus.

Trini, however, stole his question as she delivered two plastic bubble-halves and spoons to Jason and Kim. "Azalea, when was the last time you slept?" She mimed putting her hands beneath her head, closing her eyes.

Azalea, still inches from the door, hesitated. _"Kes sa sho,"_ she answered with a shrug of her shoulders. Even if the Rangers didn't completely understand her spoken language, her body language was clear: she didn't remember.

"Well, come on," Trini said, gesturing for Azalea to follow her. "You're going to take a nap and I don't want to hear any complaining."

Tommy and Kim looked at each other, then at Billy and Zack. Zack raised his eyebrows and Billy just blinked. Even Jason turned slightly in Trini's direction, a startled look on his face.

Azalea stared at Trini, then at the other Rangers as if trying to gauge their feelings. Finally, she glanced back at Trini.

"Its okay, Azalea. Go with Trini," Kim said. She smiled encouragingly at the alien girl, and Azalea slowly began to cross the room, keeping her head down and her arms tight against her body. She looked like a cat sneaking through a dog pound, afraid at any moment one of the teenagers might make a hostile move at her.

Nothing happened, and she joined Trini in the doorway to the infirmary. They disappeared from sight, and the four Rangers with sight watched and waited silently until Trini dimmed the lights, reemerged, and shut the six-pointed door behind her.

The Asian girl glanced around at them. "What?" she asked, challenging their silence.

"Well..." Tommy bit his tongue, unsure how to explain the sudden shift that had just happened. Azalea was no longer 'with them.' He had the feeling that Trini's action had just begun to pull Azalea across that line separating the Rangers from the aliens. _No long one of 'them'...but one of 'us,' _he thought. "Trini, we can't just adopt Azalea onto our side," Tommy said, choosing his words carefully. "It's hard to know where her allegiance lies."

The Yellow Ranger opened her mouth to reply, but Billy got there first. "If my theory is correct, then Azalea's people were destroyed by these very aliens. For some reason, Azalea was spared, but she is not an equal. I believe she is an expendable servant."

"Did you see her face when she walked by?" Zack interjected. "Like she thought we'd attack her or something."

Jason shrugged, his now-soggy cereal forgotten. "Maybe other prisoners have in the past." He sighed and leaned back in his chair. "I need to know what I've missed," he said. "But I'll tell you one thing right now: we're going to escape."

"How?" Kim's voice was neutral, but there was doubt in her eyes.

"We'll find a way," Tommy said. "Billy, I'll bet anything you can get that alien computer to work."

Billy nodded. "There are basic components common to every system. With Azalea's help, I hope to map out the various functions and layout of the interface. Once that is accomplished, I will look for any information such as historical records or schematics that might aid us."

"If we could find our communicators and morphers, we could teleport out," Zack said.

"Not necessarily. Remember that after the ship appeared, we couldn't get through to Zordon," Jason said, referring to Kimberly's memory. "We might need to find the source of the interference and shut it down."

"What about getting away in a vehicle of some kind?" Tommy asked. "Maybe these guys have escape pods or something."

"Most escape pods are designed for short-range flight," Billy answered. "We would need to be absolutely sure of our navigational position before to take a transport. Getting coordinates will take some time and translation."

"So it all comes down to the computer link," Tirni said in summary. She reached over to a wall panel and pressed a few buttons. A second holographic screen materialized in the center of the sitting area, covered with white squiggles and dots.

A few of the Rangers sighed as Billy nodded. He collected a sheaf of papers and pens that Azalea had gotten for him earlier, prepared to tackle the script again.

"Hang in there, guys," Jason said firmly. "We've got the Power protecting us. We'll find a way." And he put out one hand. The weight of one, two, three other hands covered his. But before the six-way handshake could be completed, Azalea opened the door of the infirmary. Her dark eyes were red-rimmed and wide as if she'd been startled awake.

Azalea carefully blanked her expression as she pointed one finger at Tommy and said, "Come. _Salya desihi sal."_

_To be continued_

_Language Translations:_

_Jason,_ _asia sal hasi: Jason, are you okay?_

_Jas asimi sho shal sei Liame-Menashi swol assisa, nais sal asia suto: I was not sure the Fire-Eaters (lit. they eat fire)_ _would help, but you are better._

_Sakal sa sho: I don't understand._

_Jas sakal: I understand._

_Jas dise prens sal: I will take you. _

_San: No/bad._

_Jason? S'es hasi. Come, s'es hasi: Jason, its okay. Come, its okay._

_Kassa: What?_

_Kes sa sho: I don't know._

_Salya desihi sal: They want you._

As always, reviews treasured!

_Next time on Power Rangers!_

It was Angel Grove...but then it wasn't. Tommy stood on the beach, watching orange waves lap at the sand near his feet. Orange? He rubbed his eyes, but the color didn't change.

"Whatever you're going to do, it won't work!" he shouted, but the words were lost to the sky. Frustrated, Tommy turned to walk away and found himself climbing a hill covered in an inch of freshly-fallen snow. Blades of grass poked through the white blanket, but they were a strange, vibrant green.

Confused, he bent down to touch the white flakes; they melted in his fingers just like real snow. And then he touched something hard. A string of sapphires so long it stretched away up the hill. "What's going on?" he whispered to himself.

- - - - - - - - -

Jason stirred slightly. His head was resting on something warm. He turned his head and heard a light, slow pattering noise reverberating as if inside something. _Like a heartbeat._ The realization made him sit up suddenly and turn around before recent memory caught up with him. He couldn't see whatever had been on the bed with him, and he sure wasn't going to reach his hands out to feel for it.

There was a skittering sound, like nails across a hard surface, a clunk, and then silence.

Heart racing, Jason looked around at nothing. Wait...not nothing...there was a blurry little green light in front of him. And there were other green lights all around. Four, to be exact, spaced equally around the room. But there was also one orange light.

Jason's elation at his sight returning dimmed as he put two and two together. The orange light was over Trini's bed.

- - - - - - - - -

He was running, slapping aside huge leaves in his haste to go back...go back where? The unfamiliar sights and sounds of a rainforest he'd never even visited filled Jason's senses in an ominous cacophony.

His bare foot caught in a root and he stumbled before regaining his footing. There was a throbbing above him and he looked up to see a gigantic ship in the sky. The very air vibrated with energy as several small pods detached themselves and descended somewhere in front of him. Were they landing?

Even though he was terrified, Jason kept running through the enormous trees, calling in a sibilant dialect that he didn't know. What was he saying? "Anassa, Dysi!" Two names, over and over again. But it wasn't even his voice. It was the voice of a little girl.

- - - - - - - - -

_Stay tuned!_


	8. Sapphires in Snow

Disclaimer: MMPR belongs to Saban/Disney. I own Azalea, the World-Burners, and their language. Yay me!

**Impending Darkness**

Chapter Eight

For a few moments, Tommy stared at Azalea. The frightened look on her face didn't change as she hovered uncertainly in the doorway.

"Azalea, why? Why are you taking Tommy?" Kim asked, standing up as if to protect her boyfriend.

The little girl shook her head and pointed to the locked door that lead out into the alien ship. _"Salya desihi _Tommy. _Sei Liame-Menashi."_

"That's got to be the name of the aliens," Zack thought out loud. "Man, that's not good."

"_Pasfavas—_please," Azalea said. "Please come, Tommy." Her large eyes begged him to understand and not to fight her.

Tommy stood up slowly, but Kimberly grabbed his arm. "No, you can't. They'll do something—hurt you again—and we won't be able to help you."

He was quick to cut in to her fearful words. "Kim, if I don't go, they might punish all of us. I have to find out if there's any way to convince them to let us go." Tommy held her gaze with his own until she nodded and released his arm.

Billy spoke up. "I would advise extreme caution, Tommy. The World-Burners or _Liame-Mean—"_ He paused, fumbling with the pronunciation.

"_Liame-Menashi," _Azalea corrected, still poised in the doorway. She was opening and closing her disfigured hand in a nervous gesture, her eyes glancing first at Billy, then at Tommy.

"The _Liame-Menashi_ have so far proven themselves unfriendly," Billy continued. "It is doubtful that speaking with them will have any effect."

Tommy glanced at the floor and took a deep breath before raising his head. "I know, but I have to try." He nodded once to Azalea, who edged out of the doorway and skirted the group. She avoided looking at them as she went to the control panel for the locked door.

"Tommy, I know you don't need us to tell you to be careful, but...be careful, bro," Jason said, standing and holding out one hand. The White Ranger took it and gripped Jason's shoulder with his other hand.

"You can count on it, Jase. Don't get into trouble until I get back," Tommy said with a faint smile.

"I'll do my best, but you know these guys. If Billy isn't playing with a computer or Trini isn't looking after someone, there's no telling what they might do," Jason replied with a grin before sobering. "I'll take care of them, Tommy."

"Sure you will." Tommy looked around at his friends one final time. "I'll be back before you know it."

Kimberly couldn't help it; she hugged him tightly, needing to feel his arms around her one last time. Tommy returned the embrace before tilting her head up and kissing her. "For luck, Beautiful," he said. Then he released her and joined Azalea near the open door.

Azalea looked up at him before motioning him through the door into a sort of airlock. As she stepped inside to join him, Kim called, "Azalea!" The little girl started violently and flinched, even though the Pink Ranger hadn't moved.

"_Kassa?"_ Azalea asked, her hand on an inside control panel.

Kimberly's brown eyes shone with tears as she said, "Please, bring Tommy back safely."

Azalea's neutral mask slipped from her face for an instant. For a moment, someone with spunk and determination shone through, and Azalea replied firmly, _"Jas dise."_ Then she straightened and the expressionless mask returned. The door irised shut and Tommy and Azalea were gone.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Tommy watched as Azalea cycled the lock on the door at the other end of the small space. The temperature in here was markedly higher, making sweat stand out on his forehead. A hot blast of wet air struck him almost like a physical force as Azalea opened the door and stepped through. He didn't know what to expect. Perhaps some kind of dim corridor with sparking wires hanging from the ceiling or threatening orange light pulsating everywhere. That was not the sight that came into view as he followed Azalea.

The hallway beyond was a soothing aqua color with curved walls. White patterns played on the colored surface; it took Tommy a moment to realize that they were strings of the alien writing, always changing. From his perspective, the sentences were made to imitate the reflection of sunlight on lapping water; crisscrossing in a natural dance that brought back memories of more relaxing days.

Azalea appeared to study one particular section of the curved wall before indicating that they were going to proceed down the corridor to the left. With a glance over his shoulder to memorize the look of the door back to his friends, Tommy went after her. The heat was nearly suffocating, and the floor beneath his bare feet was like walking on a hot sidewalk. He gritted his teeth and kept moving. _Jason didn't mention this part,_ Tommy thought. _Of course, he was wet, blind, and very confused._

That led him back to the main question: why did the World-Burners want him? Did they see him as the leader? Maybe they wanted to just talk to him. Tommy remembered Billy's warning and shook his head. They could all use a few straight answers from Zordon right about now, but that wasn't likely to happen without superior intervention.

Azalea made a right turn down a connecting hallway, also devoid of alien life. At this rate, none of the Rangers were ever going to see one of the World-Burners. And Azalea...why was she so willing to help their captors when she was probably a prisoner? Tommy watched her as she opened a panel and input a command. Another six-pointed door opened, leading into a large white room. The tint of the walls made it difficult to determine the exact size and shape, but he was willing to guess that it was round as well. And right smack in the center stood a five-foot tall cloaked figure in silver.

The door closed behind them, and Azalea immediately went to the alien and knelt, exposing the back of her neck in some kind of ritualistic gesture of submission. Tommy could just make out a horizontal burn mark above her collar. Had this alien been displeased with her at some point?

"_S'es sun?"_ The alien asked in a hissing voice.

_Reptile,_ Tommy thought, trying to get a look beneath its hood without appearing too obvious.

"_Hasi," _Azalea replied with a nod, standing and pushing her hair behind her shoulders.

"_Vesa saci hy," _the alien ordered, making a single, banishing gesture. Azalea bowed at the waist and turned around to leave. For a brief instant she looked Tommy right in the eye. Her expression didn't change, but her hands moved quickly in front of her. She brought her fists together, palms up, and opened her fingers toward him as far as she was able, as if giving him something.

"_Ves!"_ The sharp command made Azalea flinch, and she dropped her hands as she scuttled to the door and disappeared, leaving Tommy to face the World-Burner alone.

_Well, I haven't come this far not to try for some answers,_ Tommy thought. He sized up the alien as he would a martial arts opponent. What moves could this creature perform and what could he do to counter them and defend himself?

"Hello, my name is Tommy," he began slowly, fighting down a surrealistic feeling. "I'm from Earth, but I'm guessing you know that." He stopped, but the alien didn't move or give any sign of attention. Deciding that this was a good thing, he kept going. "My friends and I, we have a lot of questions about why we're here."

The silver-robed figure suddenly made the same banishing gesture. _"Sa san saet!"_ it hissed dangerously. Then it vanished into thin air. Had it been a projection? Tommy let out a half-sigh, half-growl in frustration. Now he was utterly alone in the white, round room. He checked the door; it was locked. He turned in a slow circle, at a loss of what do to next.

Tommy closed his eyes and rubbed them for a moment, trying to think. This particular foray into the unknown was going nowhere fast. He was locked in a room without anything to eat or drink, no aliens to question, and no Azalea to let him out. Somewhere overhead, a low humming sound began. Slowly, he opened his eyes. Then Tommy shut them, rubbed again, and tried opening them once more to see if his surroundings were accurate.

It was Angel Grove...but then it wasn't. Tommy stood on the beach, watching orange waves lap at the sand near his feet. Orange? He squinted, but the color didn't change. What had happened to the round room? He'd been to this particular spot many times before; were they trying to read his mind and extract information?

"Whatever you're going to do, it won't work!" he shouted, but the words were lost to the sky. Frustrated, Tommy turned to walk away and found himself climbing a hill covered in an inch of freshly-fallen snow. Blades of grass poked through the white blanket, but they were a strange, vibrant green.

Confused, he bent down to touch the white flakes; they melted in his fingers just like real snow. And then he touched something hard. A string of sapphires so long it stretched away up the hill. "What's going on?" he whispered to himself. _This has got to be some kind of hallucination or projection, just like that alien I thought I saw,_ Tommy reasoned, rolling a few of the precious blue stones between his fingers.

He straightened and began to climb up the hill, heading in the direction that would have taken him back to Angel Grove had he really been standing on the beach. When he reached the top, a displaced Angel Grove High School was sitting silent and deserted as if waiting for him.

Tommy turned to look back over his shoulder. His footprints stretched back through the snow, descending a snow-covered hill as if he'd climbed _down_ instead of _up._ A funny feeling was rising inside him, but Tommy fought it back down with a logical thought. _I've got to be in that white room still. If I walk in one direction long enough, I'll hit the wall and trace it back to the door._

Since the high school was in a direct line from the direction he'd been traveling so far, Tommy cautiously pressed onward. Then something struck him from behind and a familiar blabbering sound surrounded him.

"Ah, great. Putties," Tommy muttered, taking a defensive stance as the gray figures circled around him. Five, not even a full patrol. "All right, claybrains, you asked for it!" He threw a side kick at one and ducked a wide swing from another. The third and fourth made an attempt to grab his arms, but Tommy used their own leverage against them and broke free before striking each with a jump front kick. The fifth he decked with a couple well-placed punches to its torso.

The putties wriggled and writhed on the ground for a moment before the familiar glow of disassembly surrounded them. But instead of disappearing, they changed shape.

"Tommy...I think you've killed Kimberly," Trini gasped, blood running from one corner of her mouth. On her other side, Billy was flat on his back, trying but failing to rise.

"No, this is a hallucination," Tommy blurted, losing his martial pose in an instant. "You're not real!"

Zack managed to pull himself up enough to crawl over to the very, very still form of the Pink Ranger. "She's not breathing."

An unpreventable feeling of horror tingled down Tommy's spine as he dropped to his knees beside his girlfriend. "It's not true...it—it can't be true."

"Well, it _is,_" Jason snapped, struggling to his feet. He glared murderously at Tommy. "And now we have no choice but to kill _you."_

Billy, Zack, and Trini closed formation around Tommy, who cradled Kimberly's limp body to his chest, unable to comprehend what was happening. "No choice but to kill you," they agreed in unison.

Kimberly's eyes opened suddenly. "No choice but to kill you," she whispered. An evil smile curled at the corners of her mouth. "And we will, Tommy. We _will."_

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

"What do you think they're doing to him?" Kimberly asked for the twelfth time, pacing around in the kitchen area. She was chewing on one of her fingernails, a habit she hadn't resorted to in years. All kinds of horrible things were drifting through her thoughts. She would shove them away and remind herself that Tommy was a big kid and could take care of himself, but then one or two ideas would slip free and taunt her again. "He's been gone for hours!"

"Three hours and twelve minutes," Billy said distinctly. He was writing furiously on his fifth sheet of paper, which was covered in a neat mix of alien script and English. "Well," he corrected after a moment's thought, "three hours and twelve minutes since I was able to decipher the time-telling mechanism on this interface."

"What? How?" Trini asked. She had been sitting in a chair, a glass of half-finished water in one hand. She was starting to feel weak and shaky, and so had remained quiet and still to save her energy.

In reply, Billy held up one of the syringes from the day before. "I used the given values from the measurements on this to analyze some of the numbers on the screen. Eventually, I isolated this combination which seemed to change every second, and then again every one hundred seconds." He pointed to a vertical string of squiggles to one side of the round screen.

"Woah, wait a second," Zack said, looking up from his fifty-sixth game of solitaire. "You're saying there's a clock on that thing?"

"Affirmative," Billy replied. "Fortunately, it seems to operate in ten-digit increments, much like our own counting system. I believe this is because the aliens possess the same number of fingers as we do."

"All right, Billy," Jason said with a grin, trying to lighten the mood. "What else have you figured out?"

The Blue Ranger shuffled back through some of his earlier notations before selecting once piece of paper from the pile. "It would appear that the aliens measure their minutes with one hundred seconds, but there are only fifty minutes in an hour." He pointed to a chart. "I have been unable to observe how many hours are in a day, but I do know that they measure time as we do in the military."

"So instead of starting over at one o'clock p.m., they have thirteen hundred?" Kimberly asked, trying to devote some interest to the conversation.

"Precisely," Billy answered. "According to my calculations, every hour here is equivalent to one hour and twenty-three point three minutes of our time."

"Well, doesn't that mean that their days are longer?" Zack asked.

"Not if they have less hours in a day than we do," Jason said, thinking aloud. "But we've been keeping our own schedule ever since we got here, sleeping whenever we want. There's no way to tell if we're in sync with the aliens." He sat up suddenly as a thought occurred to him. "Maybe that's why I didn't hear any aliens around me when Azalea brought me back. It could have been their nighttime."

"Well, right now it is..." Billy checked the squiggles on the screen and a few of his own scribbles, "Twelve hundred forty-five."

"Then in five of their minutes, it will be thirteen hundred hours?" Trini asked, working out some of the math in her head. "That's almost six p.m. our time."

"Of course, that assumes that the alien's day begins with our equivalent of midnight. It could start with the first work shift or when they rise in the morning," Billy pointed out. "I will need to make further observations, such as one or two all-night sessions, but at least we can keep track of how long we are here."

"You're right, it's a good start," Jason said. He heard Kimberly start pacing again, prowling like a cat in front of a mousehole as the room fell silent. Time continued to crawl by.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Tommy had managed to lose the other Rangers by ducking inside Angel Grove High School. Everything was there, just like he remembered. Every locker, every bulletin board was in place. But the halls were empty. They echoed with the sound of his bare feet as he wandered from room to room. He didn't know how long he'd been inside, but at least it was quiet.

He tried to sort out his thoughts, but was getting nowhere. It felt like pressure was building behind his eyes. He couldn't tell if it was panic or horror at the things he was experiencing, and he kept pushing the feeling to the back of his mind, willing himself to focus. There had to be a way to get out of this, but what was it?

Tommy stopped outside the detention classroom and stared blankly at the sign. It didn't change colors or turn into something else, which he decided was a good thing. He opened the door and found himself looking at a white expanse studded with fluorescent lights sticking up from the floor like ugly coffee tables.

Swallowing, Tommy stepped inside the room and looked up at the ceiling. There were the empty desks, the teacher's table, the chalkboard with erasers—everything—above him.

Behind him, the door slammed shut and disappeared. What was going on now?

"This is a hallucination," Tommy said aloud so he could hear his own voice. "It's not real. I am not on the ceiling."

His words were interrupted as the door below him, the real door to the classroom, opened and a young man walked in as if gravity was working normally. He was dressed in a white shirt and pants, and his lengthy brown hair fell in his eyes as he looked around the classroom.

Despite the obvious wrongness of the situation, Tommy was relieved to see another person other than the fake Rangers. "Hey!" he called down.

The other guy looked around, startled. To him, the room had to look empty except for the desks.

"Up here, on the ceiling!" Tommy said, forcing the words out. _I'm not really on the ceiling, he's on the ceiling,_ he reminded himself just to keep his stomach under control.

The young man looked up, and Tommy made a startled noise of horror. It was _him!_ The other Tommy appeared to be equally shocked. "What are you, or me, doing on the ceiling?" Other-Tommy demanded.

"Look, I don't have any more answers than you do," Tommy replied. Then he paused. "Are you real?"

Other-Tommy looked slightly offended. "Yeah, I'm real enough. What about you?" He raised his hand so Tommy could reach it as if to make sure he wasn't a ghost. Cautiously, Tommy raised his own hand.

As soon as their fingers touched, the world righted itself with a violent flip and Tommy was standing where Other-Tommy had been. He collapsed into the nearest desk, his head spinning.

_I can't take much more of this,_ he thought, trying to keep his senses from going out of control.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Several more hours had passes since Tommy's disappearance. Billy hadn't been able to make much progress since his breakthrough with the clock, but he had a new theory about an additional date stamp located above the time on the interface. He was waiting for Azalea to return so he could ask her, but so far there had been no sign that the little girl would return that day. They had had lunch and supper with little to no comment and had spent most of the day brooding over their individual thoughts.

At last, Zack had grown tired of playing Trini at poker, war, Egyptian ratscrew, blackjack, and any other game they could come up with. He announced that he was going to bed, and Trini was quick to agree. She tried to get Kim to give up her vigil, but the Pink Ranger wasn't leaving the room. She took Zack's empty chair and pulled it so it faced the locked door before curling up to keep watch. Billy was also staying up to keep an eye on the clock, and Jason didn't feel like either of them would have listened if he had ordered them to try and rest, so he didn't bother.

He'd had Billy explain the bathroom to him earlier, so Jason showered before turning in for the night. For awhile, he lay on his back, staring at nothing as usual, wondering where Tommy was now and what he was going through. _If only we could be with you, bro,_ he thought.

Somewhere across the room, Zack started to snore. Jason almost smiled. Then he yawned, closed his eyes, and tried to relax. Within moments, he was deeply asleep.

An indeterminate amount of time later, he stirred slightly. Something was different. What had woken him?

His head was resting on something warm. He turned his head and heard a light, slow pattering noise reverberating as if inside something. _Like a heartbeat._ The realization made him sit up suddenly and turn around before recent memory caught up with him. He couldn't see whatever had been on the bed with him, and he sure wasn't going to reach his hands out to feel for it.

There was a skittering sound, like nails across a hard surface, a clunk, and then silence.

Heart racing, Jason looked around at nothing. Wait...not nothing...there was a blurry little green light somewhere in front of him. And there were other green lights all around. Four, to be exact, spaced equally around the room. But there was also one orange light.

Jason's momentary elation at his sight returning dimmed as he put two and two together. The orange light was over Trini's bed. He got up slowly and moved to the center of the room, listening hard. There was a noise coming from the girls' bathroom, and a sliver of light to guide him there.

He crossed the room and put one hand on the door, which swung open. Trini was on her knees, retching over the toilet. Her shoulders were shaking and Jason pressed one hand to her back, letting her know that someone was there. With his other hand, he pulled her hair away from her face.

After a long moment, the bout of sickness passed and Trini wiped her face with a cloth. There were fresh tears on her cheeks, but she looked grimly satisfied. "There's nothing to bring up but water and alien parasites," she said in a hoarse voice. "Two down, two to go." And with great relish, she flushed the toilet.

"You okay?" Jason asked. Trini jumped and turned around.

"Jason? I—I thought you were Zack or Billy." She squinted her almond eyes at him. "You...can you see?"

"A little," he said. Trini tried to say something, but Jason cut her off. "You didn't answer my question."

She opened her mouth to speak, but closed it again as if failing to find the right words. Then she held up her hands. Even though Jason's vision was extremely blurry, he couldn't miss the way they shook. "I've got nothing left," Trini said softly. "No strength, no energy, nothing. I'm...I'm scared, Jason."

He knelt beside her and put one arm around her. "I am too. I'm scared for all of us. But you've got what it takes to beat this. We're going to find a way off this ship, all of us."

"But how long will it take?" Trini whispered. "I get the feeling we don't have much time."

Jason knew she was right. Every day they stayed here, there was a chance that the aliens could destroy Earth. He could only hope and pray they hadn't done it yet.

"Come on, let's get you back in bed," he said. Trini tried to stand, but her knees gave out. Jason quickly caught and lifted her effortlessly before carrying her back to her bed.

"Jase," Trini said as she pulled her blanket up to her shoulders. "Thanks."

He nodded. "Get some sleep. I've got plans for tomorrow." Jason retrieved one of the chairs beside the small table and set it near the door, checking on Billy and Kimberly in the process. Both of them were asleep, Kim nestled in the chair, and Billy in front of the interface, his glasses askew. An additional pile of notes sat in front of him, and Jason had to smile briefly. _Good for him,_ he thought, sitting down. _He'll figure that thing out yet._

Jason settled down to watch the occupants of both rooms. If whoever was coming in at night tried again, he would catch them, even with his limited eyesight. Since Billy and Kimberly hadn't appeared to notice anything, then the person was using a method other than the door to get in and out of the room. _We could really use that knowledge to our advantage,_ he thought. _There's a way, and we'll find it._

The night stretched on.

_To be continued_

_Translations:_

_Salya desihi _Tommy. _Sei Liame-Menashi: They want Tommy. The Fire-Eaters._

_Liame-Menashi: Fire-Eaters (lit. they eat fire)_

_Kassa: What?_

_Jas dise: I will._

_S'es sun: It's one?_

_Hasi: Okay/yes._

_Vesa saci hy: Go away now._

_Ves: Go!_

_Sa san saet: Do not speak!_

As always, reviews treasured!

Author's Note: Thanks so much to PterodactylFirebird, GinaStar, and Ice-Princess-Amberfor your reviews; I reread them every time I hit a low point. I'm also sorry that not all of the spoilers from Chapter Seven got into this chapter; it's simply too long. As a result, I expect Chapter Nine will be finished far more quickly than some of the previous ones.

_Next time on Power Rangers!_

"Wait, I want to try something," Jason said, making a 'hold it' motion with one hand. "Azalea, _Anassa_ and _Dysi_." He pronounced the names exactly as he had heard them in the memory. "Do you know them?"

If he'd wanted Azalea's attention before, Jason couldn't have found a better way to capture it. She was staring at him so hard that she wasn't blinking. Then something happened, something so un-Azalea-ish that Jason and Billy nearly backed away from her. She began to cry.

As soon as the first tears fell, Azalea gasped in horror and tried to scrub them away with her hands. Then her sobs overtook her and all she could do was cover her face and shake. _"San, san," _she said, her tone mortified. _"Lemmas. Jas asi lemmas."_

Jason and Billy exchanged awkward glances. "It is all right, Azalea," Billy began, seating himself beside her. "We want to help you." As the small girl continued to try and get her emotions under control, he carefully put his arm around her shoulders. Azalea stiffened as if she'd turned into a statue. She appeared to be holding her breath, waiting for something to happen. When nothing did, Azalea turned to look up at Billy.

"H-help? _Sal desia assis saj?"_ Her disbelief was apparent on her face without Billy needing to translate the question. But there was something else in her eyes...hope? Belief?


	9. Missing Memory

Disclaimer: MMPR still belongs to Saban/Disney. They wouldn't even let me borrow it if I asked. Much sadness.

**Impending Darkness**

Chapter Nine

Kimberly stirred and sat up suddenly, and her heart rose in her throat when all she saw was darkness. She put her hands out to feel around for anything familiar, and discovered that she was on a hard, cold floor. Strangely, her ribs didn't hurt; she touched her side and encountered the unmistakable texture of her pink suit...as if she'd just been fighting a monster.

_Some more of the memory,_ she thought excitedly. _Maybe this time I'll find out what happened._ She unclasped her helmet and set it down beside her, shaking her hair out of her face before getting up. Slowly, Kimberly began to walk forward until her gloved fingertips hit an unseen barrier. Undeterred, the Pink Ranger followed the wall until she came to a corner, and then followed that wall. Two turns later, her right foot hit her helmet and she realized she'd gone in a circle.

"Great. So I'm in a cell and I can't see a thing," Kimberly said aloud, crossing her arms and trying to think of a new plan. _Well, maybe the others are nearby,_ she thought. "Trini? Tommy? Jason? Can anybody hear me?" she called, unable to tell if her voice carried or not.

A sudden glaring light flickered on overhead, illuminating her prison. The walls were clear as glass, but unbreakable as Kimberly pounded on one experimentally. She even went so far as to take a shot at it with her Blade Blaster, but the energy dissipated across the surface without making a dent.

Directly across from her another light came on, revealing another glass cell where Billy was just getting to his feet. His helmet was still on, and he appeared to shake his head before taking a good look around. Kimberly quickly went to the front and waved furiously in order to attract his attention. "Billy!" she yelled.

He cocked his head to one side and appeared to be saying something, but Kim couldn't hear him. _Looks like these things are soundproof after all,_ she thought. To her left, a third light came on. Trini was performing her own exploration of the glass case a little larger than a telephone booth that kept the Rangers separate from one another. When she saw Kimberly had her helmet off, Trini removed her own headgear and mouthed, 'Are you okay?'

Kimberly gave a thumbs-up and pointed to something on Trini's other side. Tommy was banging on the transparent walls of his cell in a blind attempt to get out before he saw the others. As soon as he spotted them, he relaxed and appeared to count everyone, just as the lights over Jason and Zack snapped on.

The six Rangers regarded each other from their separate compartments. _Just like specimens in jars,_ Kimberly thought with a shiver, remembering the biology classroom at school. An odd sort of sign language was going on between Tommy and Jason, which she didn't understand. Billy, whose cell was between them, watched the nonverbal conversation with interest. It was then that Kimberly noted the particular order in which their cases were arranged. _The same order as our beds in the infirmary room,_ she discovered with a shiver. _This has to be it. This has to be the rest of the memory._

Beyond the six glass prisons, the rest of the room was still black. When a dozen separate figures stepped out of the shadows and stood before each cell, Kim jumped and shrank back a little, nearly tripping over her forgotten helmet. Each Ranger had a pair of robed aliens, one extremely tall, and one of average height. Both of them had miniature holographic screens that they appeared to be writing on. Kimberly couldn't make out the script, but she got the distinct, unsettling feeling she was being judged.

She pried her eyes off of the World-Burners in front of her and looked to the right and left of her. Zack was standing with his helmet under his arm, staring openly at the cloaked aliens as if studying them right back. Trini was hugging her helmet to her chest and holding very still as if afraid to move. Once in awhile, the paired aliens would put their heads closer together as if comparing something. And then, one pair at a time, they moved to either side of their Ranger's glass case.

There was a vibrating noise, and the front wall of each cell melted away like it had been ice. None of the Rangers moved for a few seconds, and in those seconds, something lowered from the shadowed ceiling toward the center of the room.

It was some kind of metal globe, about the size of a beach ball. Little blue energy arcs danced across its surface, which was turning first one way, then the other as if searching for something. Then a beam of light shot out of the globe and struck Jason in the chest. He shouted in surprise as he was lifted off the ground and held suspended for an instant. His tyrannosaurus helmet clunked to the ground inside his cell and rolled away as blue circles of light formed around Jason's wrists and ankles. The energy manacles pulled his arms and legs into a spread-eagled pose even as the Red Ranger fought to resist the alien mechanism.

"Jason!" The cry could have come from any one of them, but Kimberly couldn't remember who as five more energy beams came at the remaining Rangers, pinning them in place and locking their arms and legs in an uncomfortably vulnerable position. Kim tried to wriggle and twist, but the blue circles held her in place. Soon, all six Rangers were suspended a foot or so off the floor in a ring around the restraining globe, staring out at their alien captors.

Kimberly heard Zack grunting to her right as he tried to make his arms move any distance at all. On her left, Trini was breathing deeply in an attempt to stay calm.

"What do you want with us?" Jason demanded somewhere behind Kim. "You don't know who you're messing with!"

"We don't have to be enemies," Tommy added. He started to say something else, but it was at that point that the World-Burners stepped forward. From within their robes, they produced small handheld devices that they scanned over the Rangers, stopping right above their belts...and their power coins.

"Hey! Don't touch that!" Zack yelled as his alien team removed the coin from his morpher. With a faint glow, he demorphed.

"Give it back!" Jason demanded fiercely. A faint hum told Kim he'd lost his power.

Billy's voice betrayed his fright. "Return that or else!"

"Don't even think about it," Tommy threatened. _Fhmm._ White no more.

"No way, you freaks!" Trini cried. Out of the corner of her eye, Kim saw her best friend power down.

Then it her personal guards were reaching for her belt, for her coin...for her only means of escape. "Please...please don't," was all Kimberly could think of to say. A sad sort of tingle washed over her as her suit vanished. She watched the World-Burners put the coins into a small clear case that disappeared into the robe of one of the tall ones assigned to Zack.

"Stay calm, guys," Tommy said, apparently giving up on the aliens' understanding of English. "There's got to be a way out of this."

"Well, I'm having trouble seeing it," Zack replied honestly.

"_Sa san saet!"_ Trini's shorter guard said with a hissing accent that made Azalea's pronunciation seem crystal-clear. It made a slashing gesture, indicating no more talking.

If any of the Rangers had been about to say something, they forgot about it as another vibrating noise announced the movement of something large above them. A large metal ring descended from the dark ceiling and hovered at chest-level around the cluster of powerless teenagers. The ring was bristling with unidentifiable devices: some looked like guns, others like clubs and still others with tubes, needles and scary-looking instruments.

"I've got a really bad feeling about this," Trini said faintly. Just then, Jason and Tommy yelped in surprise.

"What? What happened?" Kimberly demanded, unable to see either one from her vantage point.

"We just got turned around," came Tommy's reply.

Suddenly, the ring began to rotate, energizing with the same blue light holding the Rangers up. Then, just as abruptly, the rings stopped.

"Uh, Jason?" Billy's tone was uncertain, even panicked. "Something's happening behind you."

Kimberly heard Jason straining to turn his head around enough to see. One of the aliens made some noise that wasn't exactly a word and there was the sound of something powering up.

"Billy, I can't move my head. Talk to me," Jason said, the first note of fear in his voice.

"It would appear that one of the devices on the structure surrounding us is being programmed by the two extraterrestrials initially assigned to you," Billy said quickly, his technical jargon running together in his haste to describe what he was seeing. "The device looks like a sort of club—"

_**Crack!**_ Kimberly couldn't help it, she screamed. So did Trini. Tommy was yelling something and Billy just gasped for air. The sound of something blunt striking a human skull reverberated once in the shadowed corners of the room.

"Jason? Man, talk to us!" Zack demanded, drowning out his friends. When he received no reply, he asked, "Tommy, can you see if he's still breathing?"

Tears leaked out of the corners of Kim's eyes as Tommy was silent for a long moment. The ring began to turn again, nearly drowning out her boyfriend's answer. "Yeah, I think he's just unconscious."

"I believe I see blood on the back of his head," Billy reported as the ring shuddered to a halt. Then he went strangely silent.

"Billy? What's happening?" Trini asked.

Slowly, the Blue Ranger answered, "I believe that the aliens are going to—" His words ended abruptly in a pained cry as another _**crack!**_ filled the room.

"Billy!" Kim exclaimed.

"I'm...still functioning," he answered slowly. He was aspirating his words, meaning he probably had his teeth clenched together. "They only struck my ankle." As if dissatisfied with his words, the ring shifted one device over, so that Kimberly was looking at some sort of hose instead of a bunch of wires.

"Keep talking, Billy." Tommy apparently couldn't see what was happening to the Blue Ranger due to his backwards position.

"My arms are being pulled out in front of me," Billy said. He sounded calm, but Kimberly knew he was letting his scientific rationale control his senses. It was one of his coping mechanisms and as Billy screamed aloud once more, she knew he had good reason. The unmistakable glow of fire lit the dark walls for an instant. _Of course, his burns,_ she thought. _Now I wish I wasn't remembering all this._

And so the process continued. For each of them, the ring rotated and the aliens fed some kind of prescribed punishment into whatever device they chose. For Tommy it was a series of thin, barbed switches that ripped through his white shirt and had him crying in agony as the flesh on his back was torn away. For Trini it was two syringes filled with a yellowish substance and what Kimberly now knew were two alien parasites apiece.

Then the Pink Ranger watched as her aliens spun the ring around, coming again to the club-like device. They adjusted its height, and then stepped back. The blue manacles on her wrists pulled her arms above her head and Kim choked on a breath of air in her attempt to stay calm. _This is only a memory; the pain already happened,_ she tried to remind herself, closing her eyes tightly. _It already happened, it already happened—_

_**Crack!**_

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Tommy was sitting cross-legged on Zordon's energy tube, his head in his hands. He'd had to delve into his evil Green Ranger days to deactivate the sociopathic robot version of Alpha he'd found inside the Command Center, as well as find a way to mute the accusatory floating head that had begun to shout at him the instant he'd set foot inside. Then, of course, gravity had hiccupped or something, because one of the walls was now the floor. At the time, Zordon's tube was the only thing stable enough to rest against, and so here he was.

He dabbed at one of the many cuts on his face and arms; he'd encountered a full putty patrol that had suddenly turned into evil hawk-like birds. They had circled him, taking dives and removing pieces of his skin one beakful at a time until Tommy had managed to lose them in a tunnel that appeared. Well, the tunnel had led him here, and here he would stay until something else happened to mess with his sense of reality.

A monstrous headache was pounding between his temples, and Tommy found it impossible to keep his eyes closed. _I've been in here for hours,_ he thought dismally. _Any second now, something's going to appear and I won't have the power to fight it._

As if in response to his thought, a black cat dropped from the wall-that-was-the-ceiling and landed six feet away on the energy tube. Its brown eyes regarded him disdainfully, as any ordinary cat would have.

Tommy looked around for several more of them, but the animal was alone. "You're just a hallucination," he informed it as the cat began to wash its paws in apparent ignorance of its hallucinogenic status.

He sighed and watched it for a moment. "Go ahead. Turn into a monster or fly around the room or do something against the laws of nature. I've seen it all in here."

In response, the cat spread itself out on the smooth surface and began a lengthy stretching process that seemed to involve every muscle in its body. And then the room began to melt. The colors and textures began to run together like a sidewalk painting that had encountered a garden hose. Tommy tried to jump to the floor, but instead fell with a splash into a pool of swirling colors. The cat fell as well, hissing and spitting into what had become a rainbow-colored river. It went under and came back up purple with red streaks and yellow spots.

Tommy was forced down by a wave, flailing as his brain tried to adjust and failed. Air; he needed to surface. Pulling with his arms, unable to see in the rushing colors, he fought to get back up.

Something grabbed the back of his shirt and yanked so hard he was afraid the fabric would rip. And then glorious, sweet-smelling air filled his lungs and he coughed, spitting out pink and green. The something that had grabbed him set him down gently and began to shake itself. Tommy wiped color from his face and peered at his rescuer. The black cat had grown to the size of a large horse and was trying to get the purple, red, and yellow out of its coat. As it did so, it looked at Tommy as if expecting some kind of thanks.

"Well," he managed to pant, still attempting to regain his breath, "you're not an ordinary hallucination, but you haven't tried to kill me yet."

The huge cat shifted into a small brown-furred rabbit that hopped over to him and up into his lap. Carefully, Tommy picked it up and held it in front of his face. The rabbit was fascinated with sniffing his wet hair and even tried to eat a strand before deciding it wasn't a good idea.

As he let the small animal smell him over, Tommy noticed that his headache was decreasing. In fact, he could focus better. He took a cautious look around at his surroundings and found he was outdoors again, sitting by an otherwise normal-looking waterfall that was not filled with all kinds of strange colors. Then Tommy peered at the rabbit suspiciously. "Are you doing that?"

The rabbit shifted again and he found he was holding a small puppy that decided it would be _very_ fun to try and lick whatever part of Tommy it could reach. He sighed and set the puppy down in order to let it work off some extra energy. "Guess not."

Gazing aimlessly into the water, Tommy studied his haggard-looking reflection, until it changed to an image of Kimberly who sneered at him. Then the water began to flow backwards, falling up the waterfall. "This is not what I need right now," Tommy muttered. The puppy wandered back toward him, then turned and growled at something behind him. In a flash, the puppy had become a large grey wolf that snarled quite fearsomely at the five Rangers stepping out of the woods by the river.

Tommy looked from the wolf to the pseudo-Rangers and back at the wolf. A faint feeling like hope started to sneak into his mind, and he took his fighting stance.

"Let's see how you do against me now," he said to the Rangers. The wolf snuffed its agreement, and together they sprang at the enemy.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

"Kimberly?" Someone was shaking her. Kim opened her eyes to see Billy standing over her chair.

"Billy! Oh, you're okay." She threw her arms around him and after a moment, he returned the hug. Kim felt tears begin to slide down her face as she apologized, "I'm sorry, I just needed to know I wasn't alone for a moment." She let go of the Blue Ranger and wiped her eyes.

"Are you all right? We both fell asleep, but you began screaming and woke me up." He was holding a few of his papers and blinking quizzically at her.

Kimberly's ribs gave a renewed throb in remembrance of her dream. "I got the rest of my memory back, but it was horrible. What they did to us...we're prisoners all right."

"Kim? Billy?" Jason rubbed his eyes as he stood in the doorway. "You okay?"

"Kimberly believes she has recalled the rest of the events that transpired before our arrival in these quarters," Billy answered. There was a brief moment of silence that stretched on for several seconds.

"Where's Trini?" Kimberly asked suddenly, sensing something was terribly wrong.

"She's not feeling too great," Jason admitted. "She was sick last night and since she hasn't eaten anything..." he let the thought trail off. "Anyway, she's sleeping still. I want Azalea to have a look at her when she gets back with Tommy."

"So...so Tommy's not here." It could have been a question, but Kimberly had just heard the truth. "And I fell asleep while watching for him." The frustration in her voice made Billy speak up.

"If you had not, then we would not know the rest of the memory we lack." He took his glasses off for a moment and ran a hand through his tousled hair in a rare expression of frustration. "There are too many variables in this equation."

"Hey, we're not giving up," Jason said sternly, looking both of them in the eye. "There's still hope, as long as whoever's been helping us out doesn't get caught."

"Jason? Can you see us?" Kim asked slowly, staring up at him.

He grinned slightly. "Yeah, I can. And that means that someone came in last night and fixed me up."

"Do you believe it to be one of the _Liame-Menashi_?" Billy asked. "I heard no one enter or exit last night."

"No, that doesn't seem to be their style," Jason said without thinking. Then a funny expression crossed his face. "Now, how would I know that?"

"Know what?" Kim asked, at a loss.

He frowned and sat down in one of the chairs further inside the room so as not to disturb Zack and Trini. "I have this feeling...no, it's more than that. I have a _memory_."

"A memory of what?"

Jason thought hard, searching his mind for a moment. "A memory of a jungle...and a spaceship overhead. But it's not mine; it can't be. We were in Angel Grove when they came."

Billy seated himself and began to shuffle through his other papers, looking for a blank one. "Try to remember everything, Jason," he said, a hint of excitement creeping into his tone. "From the beginning, if possible."

"Wait, what are you thinking?" Kimberly didn't understand what was going on. "How can Jason have a memory that's not his?"

"How is it that five of us, and until recently six of us, had our memories erased?" Billy asked. "There's some sort of mind manipulation taking place. If someone wanted to help us, then the best way to do it without leaving physical or electronic evidence for our captors to find would be a memory transfer."

"Okay, I'll tell you—" Jason began, but a sudden sound interrupted him.

"Kim, Jason!" It was Zack, and he there was a distinct note of worry in his voice.

In two large steps, Jason was in the doorway and Kim was right behind him. Zack was sitting up, leaning over one side of his bed. Kimberly darted around Jason and dropped to her knees beside Trini, who was lying in a weak, gasping heap on the floor.

_To be continued_

_Language Translations:_

_Sa san saet: Do not speak!_

As always, reviews wanted!

Author's Note: Aaaah! I'm such a bad monkey! No, the spoiler from the last chapters didn't make it in here because I had all these cool things I wanted to do to Tommy and it really fit in better here...I won't even bother to promise what Chapter Ten will have in it because all these plot bunnies keep hunting me down in my sleep. I won't even mention the plot _elephant _that decided that there needed to be a sequel to this fic. GAH! I'm also sorry that this chapter wasn't longer, but I wanted to post it while I had access to go out to Rapunzl, GinaStar, Jps1926 (your review amused me mightily), Ice-Princess-Amber, and PterodactylFirebird for your wonderful feedback and support. My muse survives off the little emails I get with reviews in them. You're all awesome.

_Next time on Power Rangers!_


	10. A Burning World

Disclaimer: Yes, MMPR is Saban/Disney's. But I want it! Ooooh yessss, preciousssss...

**Impending Darkness**

Chapter Ten

"Trini? Come on, talk to me," Kimberly said, brushing her friend's hair away from her face. Somewhere behind her, Billy raised the lighting level. There was no color whatsoever in the Asian girl's normally tan features as she struggled to form an answer.

"What happened?" Jason asked Zack, who shrugged his shoulders.

"I heard her get up really slowly; she was breathing real hard. She got as far as there and then just...fell," he answered. "I tried to catch her, but it was dark and..." Zack gestured helplessly to his splinted leg.

"It's okay, you tried," Jason said. "But we've got to do something."

"Help me get her into the bathroom," Kim said, helping Trini sit up slowly and slipping her arm around her friend's shoulders. Jason quickly wrapped one arm around Trini's back and slid the other beneath her knees, carrying her as he had done only a few hours ago. This time, however, she was dead weight in his arms; all her strength was spent.

Kimberly grabbed the blanket off of her bed and rushed into the small washroom ahead of Jason. She spread the thick square of fabric on the floor beside the toilet and seated herself on it. Carefully, Jason set Trini down beside Kim so that the sick girl could lean against her for support.

"Billy, could you get me a few glasses of water?" Kimberly asked next, calm in the face of a crisis. The Blue Ranger, who had been hovering uncertainly in the doorway, vanished at her request. "And then just leave us alone until I let you know otherwise. Send Azalea in if she happens to come back." Part of her was disappointed that she might not immediately get to see Tommy if he returned, but another larger part of her knew that her best friend needed her in this time of trial.

"Kim, are you sure?" Jason asked, concerned.

Her expression hardened and she nodded. "Just pray. That's all you can do."

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Between Tommy and his wolf friend, the fake Rangers had been soundly trounced. Once defeated, they reverted into putties and disassembled just as they were supposed to.

"Thanks," Tommy said to the wolf. The wolf whuffed its agreement before moving off through the forest's dense underbrush. "Hey, wait!" he called after it. As if surprised, the wolf stopped and turned. "What are you? _Who_ are you?"

As if in reply, the wolf shifted one last time into a white tiger. Proudly, unafraid, it strode up to the White Ranger and paced once around him. _I am your protection,_ he seemed to sense as he looked into the large cat's brown eyes. _I have kept you safe._

The world flashed dazzlingly white for a moment, and Tommy had to shade his eyes. When they stopped watering enough for him to see, he peered cautiously around him and saw that the room was back to its original appearance. Tommy waited for the gravity to change, unsure if this was another hallucination. A six-pointed door opened, and a small figure clothed in black stood there.

"Tommy?" the child asked. _"Asia sal hasi?"_

"Azalea?" Tommy said stupidly, trying to piece his fractured thoughts back together. "What happened?" Her outline fuzzed for a moment, and she changed shape. With a startled yelp, Tommy jumped backward. _It's a trick! _his mind screamed. _You're still in the room and this is all just an illusion!_

"Come," Azalea was saying, stepping forward cautiously. Her outline continued to morph before Tommy's eyes, and he was so horribly fascinated that he couldn't look away. _"S'es hasi, _Tommy. _S'es hasi."_

"No, you're not real," Tommy said, feeling as if the room was beginning to spin. "I'm only seeing what I want to see..."

"**Tommy," **Azalea said slowly and with emphasis. _"Salya asihi tosamyi avas sal._ Come, you...freh-nds," she pronounced slowly. _"Salya asihi cinamyi sor sal."_ The little girl mimed pacing back and forth, wringing her hands and in general looking anxious. "Kimberly _asi cinamyi."_

The small, logical part of Tommy's brain that wanted to accept this as reality latched onto those last few words. That impression certainly resembled Kimberly when she was upset about something. At last, he forced himself to think, _Even if this isn't real, I'll get pulled into doing whatever they want anyway. Better to find out it isn't a hallucination than to stand here in fear._ He wouldn't let them think they could control him like that.

By that time, Azalea was standing within arm's reach of him, her expression calm and assured. For a brief moment, Tommy saw abnormally large ears on her head, but he blinked and the vision faded. _I've got to stop trusting everything my eyes tell me they see,_ he told himself sternly. _Whatever the aliens did is supposed to confuse me. I won't give them the chance to think they've succeeded._

"Come," Azalea said, holding out her good hand. "No touch." She reached for the front of his shirt, just as Jason had said she'd done with him. Tommy let her lead him to the door and out into the blue hallways with their dancing, shifting symbols. The world hazed out of focus for a moment and he almost fell. Azalea jumped to one side, arms out to steady him but still not daring to touch him.

Tommy regained his balance with difficulty and pressed onward as quickly as he dared. He was thankful that gravity seemed to be normal so far, but the moving patterns all around him seemed to form impossible images: his Tigerzord opening fire on his Dragonzord, him stomping on Saba in a fit of evil anger, and worst of all, him standing over the dead bodies of the other Rangers.

A dry sob welled up inside him, and Tommy had to stop and collect himself. _Those things never happened and never will happen,_ he told himself firmly, but the pictures were still there, their focus wavering as he stared.

"Tommy?" Azalea tugged insistently on his shirt. She caught him staring at the walls and said, _"Miyasa sa'a sho. Lau rilsi asihi filswia."_ She covered her eyes with her free hand in demonstration. _"S'es hasi," _she insisted.

It took every bit of faith Tommy had left to shut his eyes tightly and make his feet move forward again. He knew now how Jason had felt making this trip; the temperature didn't matter so much when you were confused and blind. Every step was uncertain and you were being led by an alien you weren't sure was friend or foe. Tommy set his jaw and clenched his fists. Well, he was still alive and fighting, hallucination or not. _They will not win,_ he told himself as Azalea slowed, stopped and input a command into a door panel. _Not a chance._

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

He was running, slapping aside huge leaves in his haste to go back...go back where? The unfamiliar sights and sounds of a tropical forest he'd never even visited filled Jason's senses in an ominous cacophony.

His bare foot caught in a root and he stumbled before regaining his footing. There was a throbbing above him and he looked up to see a gigantic ship in the sunset-streaked sky. The very air vibrated with energy as several small pods detached themselves and descended somewhere in front of him. Were they landing?

Even though he was terrified, Jason kept running through the enormous trees, calling in a sibilant dialect that he didn't know. What was he saying? "Anassa, Dysi!" Two names, over and over again. But it wasn't even his voice. It was the voice of a little girl.

Something threw itself into his path; Jason's headlong momentum carried him past whatever it was without pause. It was the words that made him stop.

"_Pasfavas...assis..."_ A dry, raspy voice came from the dark form lying amidst the matted underbrush of the forest path. In the creeping twilight, it was difficult to make out any features. Jason cautiously knelt down and reached out one hand. The hand had four fingers. He wasn't himself; he was inside someone else's body.

The person on the ground was gasping and wheezing as if having trouble catching his or her breath. In the failing light it was difficult to see what the person looked like; they were wearing a mottled brown garment designed to make them blend in. But Jason caught the glitter of large dark eyes as the person continued to pant spasmodically.

"How can I help you?" The little girl's voice issued from his mouth again, still in the same strange dialect, but somehow Jason understood the thoughts behind them. He—or the child he was—had an obligation to heal whatever this creature was.

"_Pasfavas assis,"_ the person repeated, pulling him or herself up.

Without consciously willing it, Jason found himself kneeling to get a better look. He had to ignore the spaceship overhead, the small vehicles landing somewhere nearby, the discordant jungle noises all around him—everything.

"Be still," the girl said. "I will heal y—"

A scream came from somewhere ahead followed by a choked cry. A commotion grew from the direction of his—her—camp. Jason was having trouble keeping himself separate from the memory-dream.

More screams and indistinguishable shouts were spreading, growing louder. His family! Anassa and Dysi; were they hurt?

"_Assis,"_ the shadow in front of him implored. Jason hesitated, torn. He didn't know this person; he or she wasn't of his kind, and his family might need him—

The person suddenly leaned forward and touched his face; the hand was small but it burned instantly. It was worse than when he had taken a pot out of Anassa's kiln and it had burned his—her—hands. To Jason it was like having a brand held to the left side of his forehead.

He could sense the strangeness of the creature: reptilian like a lizard, small for its size, and young. There was a familiar poison in the blood. This creature had been bitten by a _thyssiar; _a large spider-like animal.

Jason pushed the burning agony to the back of his mind as the healing power of his people naturally surged forward, out into the being in front of him. Then, gasping with the pain of the burn, Jason broke the physical contact between them and moved backwards, fighting to get back up and run to the camp.

"_Ares!"_ The young creature sprang upright and blocked his path. _"Sal histoma aj vaissa. Jas dise hy histo laui."_

The girl that Jason was didn't understand, but she was afraid of the burning touch. It was beyond her power to heal herself; Anassa or Dysi could fix the burn that seared over her eye. "I want to go back," the girl demanded fiercely. "My people can help me. Something is wrong; I must find them!"

"_San!"_ the being ordered, its moist skin catching the final rays of sunset. Its large, triangular head with opaque eyes was expressionless and set. Jason knew what that word meant: no. He heard new sounds now: someone or something was coming in their direction from the camp.

"_Rasyl! Das asia sal?"_ The alien language made no sense to the girl, but Jason recognized the word for 'you.' The young creature called a reply, and the crashing of hurried footsteps momentarily drowned out the noises of distress coming from his people. More of the lizard creatures surrounded Jason, trapping him in the center. His eyes darted around to all the various-sized beings trying to find a hole in their defenses. If he could get past them, he could help the hurt ones in the camp. The burn on his—her—forehead seemed to pulse with agony as he tried to focus.

Jason saw an opening between two of the brown-garbed creatures, wide enough to admit a small child if the child was very fast.

Without another thought he darted forward, around the young one and made for that gap toward his camp. Quicker than a snake striking, one of the tall creatures snatched him by the collar of his shirt and bodily lifted him off the ground. Feet kicking, the girl that Jason was began yelling in earnest.

"Anassa! Help me Anassa! There are evil strangers here! Dysi, please help me!" He could feel the heat coming from the hand holding him aloft and so did not struggle very hard. However, when another creature prepared to clap a hand over his face, the young lizard-creature cried out.

"_San, eysi assismai saj. Eysi tiesh shash ayse vaissa sy yasima."_

One of the tall ones spoke. _"Sal tiesa sho, Rasyl. Yals sun es asi ursiamai deas toso im aylas. Ri sa'a sal sho lisea lau ciones?"_

The small one hissed angrily; he or she was being challenged. Jason could almost hear the condescension in the older alien's voice. _"Jas kes aj ciones. Tiesa sal sho orisa aylas hiyswia? Salya asihi aleahwia eca hios moras. Yals sun—" _and the small creature pointed at Jason who was silently dangling by his shirt, _"—shasmai ayse syi alysin si asimai saci ey sei menaswia hosti."_

The alien words, which Jason now recognized as Azalea's current language, made next to no sense to him, just as they hadn't to the little girl. But there was something else, a dormant kind of knowledge he couldn't touch. If this was a true memory of some kind, then the girl that had experienced it probably understood now what these aliens—the World-Burners—had done to her people. The memory, however, didn't allow him to access that knowledge.

The aliens were still arguing with one another as the disturbing sounds from the camp grew fainter before fading away altogether. The little girl summoned up her courage and thrashed suddenly, forcing the creature suspending her in midair to drop her. As fast as she—he—could go, Jason got up and ran, ran in the direction of home, safety, and help. A spot on the back of his neck stung from the creature's burning hand, but he ignored it.

Loud, crashing steps behind him told Jason he was being pursued. He ducked off the main path and slid belly-down on a large, moss-covered tree trunk that had fallen on a downward slope, coming to a stop only when he reached the end. Jason scrambled over a humongous, dozing snake and slipped through some vines that made faint humming noises when they moved. At the moment, he couldn't hear the sounds of the reptile creatures with heads like lizards, but they could probably smell him.

The camp's edge was just ahead; his family's tent was toward the center, so Anassa could carry fire coals from the main pit to her pottery oven. Jason put on an extra burst of speed and broke into the forest clearing, only to stop short in surprise and horror.

The members of the little girl's camp were dead. Any healer close enough could sense the death of another, just as they could feel life. Jason had no human comparison exact enough to describe the overwhelming sense of tearing, wrenching emptiness that momentarily blotted out all other feeling. For a moment he thought he would be physically sick, but he forced himself to keep moving forward.

He passed the bodies of men, women, and children. Some had blood on their faces, while others had boils, spots, and other signs of disease. It was like all the different plagues and sicknesses the girl had ever seen had struck the small population in minutes. Some of the symptoms the girl he was didn't know and so Jason didn't know. He threaded his way between the tents, trying to avoid looking at the faces of his—her—people.

The tent the girl called home was empty, but a partially-eaten evening meal sat by Anassa's stove. She and Dysi had eaten supper as normal, both awaiting their daughter's return. But something had interrupted them, and that something had probably killed them.

Jason backed away, the eyes he was looking through darting around for the two people that should have been there. Night had truly fallen, and the only light came from the main fire pit as well as the many small cook fires that were just now beginning to dim for want of tending.

Then, a noise. Jason dove into the nearest shadow and crept toward the source, heading deeper into the camp. There was the faint feel of a life fading quickly, almost smothered by the blackness of death all around it. The weak aura was familiar to the girl, like a favorite scent. Jason couldn't compare it with anything he'd ever experienced. If he knew what touching a soul felt like, perhaps it would have been similar.

"Ardsi? Ardsi!" A brief flash of the girl's thoughts showed a wizened old man capable of mending any broken tool or toy. His tent was covered in bright, cheery images, but as Jason approached the dwelling now, he saw that it was leaning badly. It looked as if a battle had been waged outside as well as inside.

The body of a man was lying in the entrance of the tent, and Jason's vision blurred suddenly. The little girl started to cry as she recognized Dysi. He was crumpled as if a giant hand had picked him up and thrown him down again, breaking most of his bones. The girl didn't dare touch him for fear of contracting whatever illness or madness had swept her camp, unabated by her people's healing powers.

She forced herself to move, stepping over the body and through the open tent flap. A few flickering rays of firelight lit the tent's interior, outlining Ardsi's bent form. He was propped against a stool, fighting to breathe. More bodies surrounded him, and a sour smell reached her nose.

"Who's there?" Ardsi said in a strained whisper that quickly degenerated into a coughing fit.

"Anassa and Dysi's child," she answered quietly. "Please Ardsi, let me heal you."

He appeared not to hear her. "Did you finish the rite, Anassa and Dysi's child?" _He can't see me, _Jason realized.

"Ardsi, please!" Jason started forward, intending to heal the old man and get some answers.

"**No!"** His hoarse shout stopped the girl mid-step. "Leave this place, child. Go and tell others what has happened this night. Keep this memory, and give them your name, which shall be..." Ardsi's eyes closed and he didn't move again. Jason felt the life fade from his old body, and the little girl shook with sobs.

Outside, the voices of the aliens reached him and Jason knew his window of opportunity was shrinking. He dashed from the tent and scuttled into the nearest shadow, listening, trying not to breathe too loudly. Looking out from the center of the camp, he could now see tall metal shapes surrounding the entire clearing like guards. _The small ships that landed earlier,_ Jason thought. _If I can get past them, I can hide in the forest._

_Thump!_ The close noise made him jump, and he instinctively darted in the other direction. A large hand swept down out of nowhere and grabbed the front of his shirt, lifting him off the ground. Jason found himself nose-to-nose with one of the tall, lizard-like creatures. Its tongue flicked out once as if to test the scent of its prey before speaking to a small badge on the front of its shirt.

"_Jas shas se. Ves lis sei faosa. Sal tiesa deosa liameyilswia kies nyas."_

The girl gave up on struggling and focused on what she could see of Dysi's body. Jason sensed that she wasn't angry. She was drawing strength from the memory she had of Dysi's life. She reminded herself not to be afraid, to honor the chance of life she'd been given.

That logic kept her tears back as the large alien carried her through the camp. She had to keep the memory of her people so she could warn others. However, as soon as her captor went to one of the metal ships and opened a door, the girl started thrashing. Where would this lizard-creature take her?

Jason was thrown unceremoniously to a warm metal floor where he watched as the door closed out his—her—world. By the time the last sliver of campfire light had disappeared, the alien had vanished, leaving him alone. There was a rumble, and he climbed unsteadily to his feet, not caring about his surroundings as long as he could look at his home one last time.

He located a window and pressed his face to it, looking at the jewel-like light of all the fires against the velvety darkness. The rumbling around him increased and Jason watched as the bright spots began to shrink. Then some grey, wispy things began to block his view, and he realized that the ship was ascending though the cloudy atmosphere. The little girl, however, didn't understand what was happening until the curve of her planet became apparent. Her small hands clenched the window ledge as she simply stared. Her world...she was not a part of it anymore.

A blue energy arc sped past, leaving a searing trail of red and pink across his vision. Jason blinked furiously, focusing on the ever-shrinking world below. He saw the arc impact on the surface, and suddenly the dark face of the planet began to glow an angry orange color. _Pyroforming,_ Jason thought. _They're burning the world._

Sudden pain made him wince; the girl was digging her fingernails into her cheeks, watching with silent tears as the only home she had ever known was forever snatched from her grasp.

Jason jerked upright with a sound that was half a yell and half a sob, left over from the memory. Heart racing, he patted himself down and checked to make sure he had five fingers again, taking several moments to orient himself to his surroundings. When he finally managed to get control of his thoughts and focus again, he saw a familiar, if bedraggled, person standing just inside the locked doorway. The sight pushed the last vestiges of the memory from his mind.

"Tommy?" The White Ranger's eyes widened at the sound of his name and he stared at Jason as if he didn't recognize him. Unexplainable horror filled Jason as Tommy continued to look around as if he didn't know where he was. He had dark circles under his eyes, but didn't seem to be physically hurt. "Bro, what happened to you?"

It was then that Jason noticed Azalea standing just behind Tommy, almost as if hoping to stay out of sight. Did she imagine that the Rangers were going to punish her for their friend's condition?

Setting any sort of retaliatory thought aside, Jason came toward them and spoke quickly. "Azalea, we need your help. Trini's really, really sick. She and Kim are in one of the bathrooms, but it's not looking good. You've got to help them."

"Trini?" Azalea repeated, stepping out from behind Tommy. What might have been a look of concern flitted across her face for an instant before vanishing. "Okay—_hasi._" The little girl dodged around Jason and past Billy, disappearing into the infirmary room.

Jason remained standing in front of Tommy, trying to gauge his best friend's feelings. His stance was slightly defensive and his eyes were darting from Jason to Billy as if Tommy were trying to make up his mind about something.

"Tommy? Say something, man." Jason held out his hand, hoping Tommy would complete the familiar handshake. Instead, the White Ranger raised his fists as if to ward off an attack. And then he spoke for the first time.

"No...Jason, I can't..." Tommy's words were slow and halting, as if they came from a distant part of him.

_Well, at least he knows who I am,_ Jason thought with a slight feeling of relief. He lowered his hand and tried, "Can you tell us what happened?" Tommy remained silent, his brown eyes filled with confused fear that made Jason both angry and concerned.

"Jason," Billy spoke up from behind him, "perhaps you should maintain a safe distance between you and Tommy."

Jason glanced at the Blue Ranger sharply. "Why?"

Billy came closer and muttered so that Tommy couldn't overhear, "If Tommy has been made to fear us through further mind manipulation, gaining his trust will be difficult if we do not respect his current feelings."

"You think the aliens played with his head?" Jason asked, shooting another look at Tommy, who was watching them warily.

"It is a distinct possibility. In any case, he has been absent for almost twelve hours of alien time. If he is not in need of sleep, then Tommy is at least in need of food," Billy pointed out. "We can't obtain the information we desire unless Tommy supplies it willingly, so we should not exert undue force upon him."

Jason sighed and stared at the floor for a moment before turning toward the doorway to the infirmary. "If Trini wasn't so sick, I'd pull Kim in here right now and have her straighten him out."

"Hey guys!" came Kimberly's voice as if she'd heard them. "Can we get some help in here?"

"Stay with Tommy," Jason told Billy as the Blue Ranger took a limping step in the direction of the infirmary. "See if you can get him to eat something or at least sit down before he falls down. Let me know if you think of something that could help us."

Billy hesitated, torn between wanting to make sure Trini was all right and keeping an eye on Tommy, who had relaxed slightly but hadn't stepped away from the far entrance. Then he nodded. "Please do not allow Azalea to leave the vicinity; we must speak at length with her if we are to make any significant progress with the computer interface."

"Hurry up!" Now Zack was joining in. "There's not a lot I can do in here."

Jason managed a quick "Okay," to Billy before bolting into the infirmary. "What's wrong?" he asked, edging past Zack, who was leaning against Kim's bed and attempting to peer into the small bathroom without getting in the way.

Kimberly had her arms around Trini, who was taking slow sips of water from one of the round glasses held by Azalea. The Pink Ranger looked up at Jason's arrival and smiled a weary smile. "She got the last two up, and that means she's clean. You wouldn't believe how happy that made Azalea."

He couldn't help it; he looked at Azalea's expressionless face and decided he'd have to take Kimberly's word for it. "No more parasites?"

Kim shook her head. "I think Azalea wants to do another medical scan, though. She was kinda surprised when I explained what had happened, like it was a new thing."

Azalea put the glass down and crouched down in front of Trini to study her pale face. _"Komas asia sal?"_ she asked the Asian girl quietly. Then she imitated a few different things: being in pain, feeling tired, or feeling fine.

Trini's voice was weak and shaky when she answered, "A little sick." She tried to raise her own hand to make an explanatory gesture, but couldn't. She looked up at her friends for help.

Jason suddenly understood why it had taken so long to communicate with Azalea when he hadn't been able to see. The other Rangers had been drawing pictures, making gestures; anything that would allow them to understand. Well, he'd have to give it a shot, as his hands were the only ones free and in Azalea's line of sight at the moment. "Azalea," he said to get her attention. Jason copied her 'in pain' motion twice, exaggerating one to the point where he was bent double and downplaying the other considerably. Then he pointed to Trini and repeated the slightly 'in pain' motion.

"_Jas sakal,"_ Azalea said with a nod. Then she gestured for Jason to pick Trini up with a _"pasfavas?" _at the end to show she was requesting, not ordering. He complied, and shortly the four Rangers present were attempting to interpret Trini's latest hologram while Azalea kept switching views every one and a half seconds.

"What does all the pink mean?" Zack asked, squinting as if the image would explain itself if he stared harder. The disconcerting color traced most of Trini's digestive system, but Azalea did not look overly concerned.

"It's probably left over from the parasites," Kimberly guessed. She had a reassuring hand on her best friend's arm, waiting for the scan to finish. Azalea appeared to check a few more things, then went to one of the barely discernible compartments holding medical supplies and pulled out something that was about the size and shape of a ten-color pen with a large release button on top. That was where the similarity ended, however. This thing looked like a syringe with an electronic readout on the side, and was obviously alien. As the four of them watched, Azalea set a few numbers on it and slid open another wall panel to reveal some type of machine.

"What's that for?" Jason wasn't sure which to point at first, the syringe-thing or the new device.

Azalea appeared to think about how to explain. _"S'es lis prens criss su _Trini." Azalea pointed to the hologram of Trini's circulatory system and indicated the veins in the crook of the arm. She mimed putting the syringe there, point first, and pressing the large button on the end. Then she made a pulling gesture, in essence saying that the syringe would remove something.

Zack put it together first. "A blood sample, right?" At Azalea's blank look, he waved one hand and said, "We get it. What's the other thing?"

"_Kassa?" _Trini managed to translate, and Kim pointed to the machine.

"Ah, _jas sakal,"_ Azalea said, going over to it. Then, as if suddenly inspired, she went back to the previous compartment and removed another syringe, fiddling with the settings. _"Ares, jas dise domim sal." _With that, Azalea set the first syringe down carefully where the Rangers could see it. Then she used her free hand to pull up the hem of her black tunic slightly. Almost quicker than they could follow, Azalea pressed the second syringe to her pale skin and held down the button on top. There was a chime from the small instrument, and then a second chime less than a second later.

"_Sal lisea'a?" _she asked, removing the extractor from her hip and pulling her shirt back down. Azalea held out the semi-transparent tube so that all of them could see the dark red blood inside. Then she went to the machine, inserted the syringe, and adjusted a few of the controls. A circular screen appeared, just like the holographic drawing screen or the computer interface, and data began scrolling across it in squiggles and dots.

None of the Rangers spoke for a few moments. Finally Kim plucked up enough courage to say, "Trini? What do you think?"

What might have been a smile crossed her best friend's wan features. "I think I don't like alien needles any better." Zack managed a laugh and Jason and Kim grinned; Trini was still Trini. The Yellow Ranger gathered her breath and paused before saying, "Okay—_hasi, _Azalea."

The alien girl retrieved the first syringe and checked her settings again before approaching Trini. She was almost too short; the bed was a little below eye level for her, and Jason was tempted to get one of the chairs for Azalea to stand on. However, before he could say anything, she had applied the syringe to Trini's arm and had withdrawn the sample. Trini didn't even have time to wince.

"Okay?" Azalea asked, careful not to touch the Asian girl. At Trini's nod, she went to the analyzing machine and changed out the samples, discarding her own into a compartment labeled with a large white symbol that probably stood for 'biohazard.' Under Azalea's careful hands, new data filled the round screen hanging in midair. Azalea squinted and rubbed her eyes as she watched the strange alphabet scroll by, pausing the script once in awhile with the touch of a finger.

"What do you think it says?" Zack muttered to Kimberly. She shrugged in bewilderment. Jason crossed his arms as he watched a small child interpreting information that could possibly affect Trini's life.

At one point, Azalea had to stop and reverse the flowing words. She kept rubbing her eyes and even shook her head once, violently, which made Kim jump.

"_Hasi," _Azalea finally said with a firm nod. _"Ess tosami."_ Next, she went to yet another compartment and removed two more things: a round sac filled with some sort of liquid and tubing with which to connect it to something or someone. The sac she hung from a hook that extended itself from the wall, and like a professional nurse, Azalea checked the hologram a few more times before pointing to the area just below Trini's collarbone.

"_Yals dise assis sal wosia suto,"_ she said to Trini with a small, encouraging smile. It was the first time Trini had seen her use the expression, and somehow, it made her calm. Needles she hated, being helpless she hated, but this small girl had just shown a tiny bit of compassion to a total stranger. Trini didn't have to know for certain that Azalea had just said this intravenous stuff would help her; she understood despite the language.

Trini was aware that Kim was squeezing her hand tightly, and that Jason and Zack were right there on her other side. She could do this; her friends and now this alien girl were behind her. There was just one thing to say: _"Hasi."_

_To be continued_

_Language Translations:_

_Asia sal hasi: Are you okay?_

_S'es hasi, Tommy._ _S'es hasi: It is okay, Tommy. It's okay. _

_Salya asihi tosamyi avas sal: They are finished with you._

_Salya asihi cinamyi sor sal: They are worried for you._

_Kimberly_ _asi cinamyi: Kimberly is worried._

_Miyasa sa'a sho. Lau rilsi asihi filswia: Do not look. Your eyes are lying._

_Pasfavas assis: Please help (me)._

_Ares: Wait!_

_Sal histoma aj vaissa. Jas dise hy histo laui: You saved my life. I will now save yours._

_San: No/bad._

_Rasyl! Das asia sal: Rasyl! Where are you?_

_San, eysi assismai saj. Eysi tiesh shash ayse vaissa sy yasima: No, she helped me. She can have her life as thanks._

_Sal tiesa sho, Rasyl. Yals sun es asi ursiamai deas toso im aylas. Ri sa'a sal sho lisea lau ciones: You cannot, Rasyl. This one is to be killed like all of them. Or did you not read your orders?_

_Jas kes aj ciones. Tiesa sal sho orisa aylas hiyswia? Salya asihi aleahwia eca hios moras: I know my orders. Can you not hear their screaming? They are healing each other to death._

_Yals sun shasmai ayse syi alysin si asimai saci ey sei menaswia hosti: This one had her own water and was away at the eating time._

_Jas shas se. Ves lis sei faosa. Sal tiesa deosa liameyilswia kies nyas: I have it. Go to the ships. You can start pyroforming when ready._

_Komas asia sal: How are you?_

_Jas sakal: I understand._

_Pasfavas: please?_

_Kassa: What?_

_Ares, jas dise domim sal: Wait, I will show you._

_Sal lisea'a: You see?_

_Ess tosami: It is finished._

_Yals dise assis sal wosia suto: This will help you get better._

_­_

Reviews are like air to my muse, who would like to keep breathing!

Author's Note: This is officially the longest chapter yet, and I feel like next to nothing was accomplished in the action department, but I promise that it's coming! Really, read the spoiler at the end. Thank you to the following people for entertaining my muse during the production of this last chapter by providing reviews:

Jps1926 (whose review made me say 'cliffhanger? where?' out of sheer forgetfulness)

Archmore (who is brief and to the point)

GinaStar (who is getting good at this intuitive thing)

Ice-Princess-Amber (who is very understanding of authorship struggles)

Cmar (whom I have missed greatly and am glad to know is still reading!)

PterodactylFirebird (whose review made me laugh)

DeviousNevius (whose review I reread four times in two minutes)

and

Sam (who is the first. Always the first.)

_(Hopefully) Next time on Power Rangers!_

Azalea was looking at Jason, but she didn't appear to be listening. She blinked once, slowly as if she wasn't seeing straight. Then, appearing to realize that she'd just been asked a question, she tried to answer but no sound came out.

Kimberly, who as a teenager had seen more girls pass out than any of the others, dove forward and caught Azalea just as she started to fall. The small girl collapsed bonelessly and Kim was careful to avoid touching her skin just as a precaution. She gestured for Jason to help her lift Azalea onto the nearest chair, and then covered her with a blanket.

"What's wrong?" Jason asked. "You don't think the aliens are experimenting on her too?"

Kim darted a glance over her shoulder at the unresponsive form of Tommy. "That's the last thing we need." She shook her head despairingly. "If Azalea can't continue to help us, what will we do then?"

Just then, Billy came back into the room. He had a few new pages of notes on the blood analysis machine in one hand, but when he saw the looks on his friends' faces, he asked, "What happened?"

"She just passed out," Kim reported. "We're not sure but...do you think the aliens are messing with her?"

Billy thought back to the blood sample Azalea had taken from herself. Something was nagging at him, something... "Kimberly, could you examine the skin where she took her own sample from?"

Though Kim thought the request a little odd, she knelt beside Azalea and pulled aside the blanket enough to lift the edge of her black shirt. And then she gasped.


	11. Telling Memories

Disclaimer: MMPR belongs to Disney/Saban, but I'm going to try and see if they'll work out a deal with me on Ebay...

**Impending Darkness**

Chapter Eleven

Once the other Rangers were sure that Trini was no longer in danger, which involved Azalea repeating, _"Eysi diseh asih hasi!"_ several times in an exasperated tone, Jason decided it was time to take charge and regroup on knowledge. He had yet to tell the others about the memory he'd experienced, and if at all possible, he wanted to hear Tommy's story. He'd begun to form a vague plan in his mind, and with a little ingenuity on Billy's part and a lot of distractions from himself and the others, it just might work.

Kimberly, however, was more concerned about Tommy. She hadn't heard the conversation between Billy and Jason, but knew even before Jason opened his mouth that something was wrong. Thus she was able to interject the question weighing heavily on her mind: "Where is he and what have they done to him?" She wanted to run right out into the common room and look for Tommy, demand an explanation and solve the whole thing with a kiss, but the expression on Jason's face told her that wouldn't be a good idea.

"He's out there with Billy," Jason answered with some hesitation. Kim didn't move. Something told her that she needed more information. "Kim...Billy thinks the aliens did something to his brain. It's like..." He fished for a comparison. "Like on Rita's island of illusion, when he thought we were all putties and he started to panic. It's like he can't see us as we really are and he's afraid that we might hurt him."

"So maybe the aliens made him think we were his enemies or something?" Zack asked. He sighed heavily and shook his head. "Man, if they can do this to us, break us up and make us fight each other, we won't have a chance of getting out of here."

"We're stronger than that," Trini said quietly. A touch of color had returned to her face already, and she was looking at them with far more focus than before. "Tommy recovered from an illusion once, and he can do it again. We all did."

"One thing's for sure," Jason said. "We've got to put all our heads together. You guys won't believe some of the stuff I saw in that memory." At Trini and Zack's blank looks, he explained, "I have a memory that's not mine. I must have fallen asleep earlier or my mind just wandered, but it was like I was there when the aliens destroyed an entire world." An uncontrollable shudder ran up his spine, and Jason had to force the next words out. "I was the last survivor of the planet. The only survivor. I saw what the aliens did to a village...and now I know what they'll do to Earth if we can't stop them."

"Speaking of memories..." Kimberly said slowly, "I still have to tell you guys about how we got here, now that I know the rest." She cast an anxious glance towards the next room. "Do you think we could get Tommy to sit down and listen? Maybe just being around us will help."

Zack, however, was looking at Azalea. The little girl had seated herself in one of the chairs by the small table in the center of the room and was going over the results from Trini's blood sample again and again, as if she couldn't figure something out. Every minute or so, her head would tilt forward, and then she would jerk upright again and dart a look around as if afraid of being watched. "Hey Kim," he said in a low voice so that Azalea wouldn't overhear. "What's up with Azalea?"

Kimberly, whose mind was anywhere but on the underage alien in the room, stared at Zack as if she hadn't heard the question. "What?"

Zack made a shushing motion before pointing to Azalea. "I get the feeling something's not right."

"She looks exhausted," Trini said quietly. "I know she didn't sleep hardly at all when I told her to."

"She got interrupted by the aliens," Zack said darkly.

"Maybe there's something on the screen she doesn't get," Jason said thoughtfully.

Kimberly pondered that in the small part of her brain that wasn't worrying about Tommy. "Well, if it was supposed to take two weeks for the parasites to die, then maybe she can't figure out why it happened so soon?"

"Well, that's easy," Zack said, as if it were obvious. At their expectant looks, he seemed momentarily surprised. "I mean, think about it. They didn't die until Trini flushed 'em. You get it? It looks like humans have some kind of defense system against those things, and Azalea wasn't expecting that. If _she_ were to have those things, then maybe it would take _her_ two weeks to get them out of her system."

A slow smile spread across Trini's face. "Zack, you're brilliant," she said. "She must be trying to figure out why it happened."

"Funny thing though," Jason said thoughtfully. "She didn't seem so shocked when Tommy's cuts mysteriously got better or when I got my sight back."

At the mention of her boyfriend's name, Kim stood up straight and stomped one foot. "Oh, that's _it!"_ Jason took an instinctive step backwards; the Pink Ranger was entering 'mission mode,' something she had picked up from Trini. Kimberly directed a determined look at the other three. "I'm going to get Billy _and_ Tommy, and we're all going to sit down and talk this stuff out together." With that, she spun around and vanished into the next room.

Seconds later, Billy hastily joined the other Rangers, a pink flush coloring his face and ears. He had what looked like a miniature book with him; all his notes on the various things he'd managed to translate so far. "Tommy and Kimberly will be here...eventually," Billy said, obviously embarrassed.

Jason raised an eyebrow. Zack raised _two_. Trini let out a knowing laugh before stifling it with one hand. "Way to go, Kim," she said after a moment. "Straighten that boy out."

"What'd she do?" Zack asked Billy, hoping to get an answer from the Blue Ranger before he got distracted by the new technological doodads Azalea was currently playing with.

Billy appeared to replay something in his head before answering. "Well, Kimberly approached Tommy with increased velocity, and as Tommy was sitting with his back toward her, he did not have sufficient time to react to her presence. He attempted to strike her with less than normal enthusiasm, but Kimberly diverted the attack before pinioning his legs by applying her body mass to his."

Jason had the foresight to interrupt Billy at that point, needing a translation rather badly. "Uh, Trini?"

"He said that Kim surprised Tommy by sitting on his lap," Trini answered, laughter in her voice. "Keep going, Billy."

Reluctantly, Billy went on, "Tommy's facial expression indicated that he was equally divided between the emotions of fright and hope. Kimberly said, 'It's good to have you back, Tommy, no matter what.' Then they began..._kissing."_ Obviously Billy couldn't think of a scientific way to explain that particular public display of affection.

"Yeah, that's Kim all right," Zack said with a grin. "There's two ways to solve a problem: hitting it or kissing it."

As if on cue, Kimberly appeared, towing Tommy by one hand. Her eyebrows were drawn together in resolve and she strode right into the center of the room, pulling her boyfriend after her. Tommy didn't appear to be offering much resistance, but his gaze darted around the room distrustfully all the same. Kim pushed Tommy into a chair next to Azalea before dragging the third over for herself.

It was only after she'd settled beside Tommy that Kimberly saw the grins and winks passing among her friends. She almost opened her mouth to say something, but shrugged and decided that her victory needed no comment from her.

"All right," Jason said, just as if he were calling a meeting to order. "We're going to get ourselves on the same page. A lot's happened and we haven't all been together for it. We've got things to talk out, so I figured we'd start with Kim's missing memory and go from there."

Kimberly searched her brain for a starting point, and at last made up her mind that from beginning to end would be best. So she started with the almost-'zord battle against Alarmo and went straight through her memory of their capture until her ribs ached anew with remembrance. During her recitation, Trini and Billy kept analytic eyes on Tommy. To their surprise, he appeared to be listening. More than that, the longer he listened, the more tension left his body.

_So his mind has not been altered to a point where he cannot receive and process new information,_ Billy thought.

"Billy?" Jason prompted, as if he'd already tried to get the Blue Ranger's attention once or twice.

"Yes?" Billy responded, startled. "Did you say something?"

"I asked you to tell us your theory of mind manipulation again," Jason said patiently. "It might jog some other people's thoughts."

Billy began shuffling through his papers; he really needed to make a table of contents and put numbers on all his pages. "Well, my current hypothesis is that the _Liame-Menashi_ possess some sort of memory and/or mind altering device which has allowed them to erase certain portions of our recollection."

He paused, and Trini translated, "He thinks the aliens have a memory-erasing machine."

"Precisely," Billy said with a nod. "However, as both Tommy and Jason have received some sort of medical care, we can assume that we have at least one or more allies aboard this ship. Jason believes he has a certain memory that did not previously belong to him. My theory is that the aliens might be able to _add_ specific knowledge to our minds by transmitting memories."

Trini took over. "There are friendly aliens that might be giving us hints by leaving us memories." She stopped and then added her own opinion. "It would have to be at night then, since Tommy woke up that one morning and his back was better."

"And I heard something moving around," Jason reported. He got a few looks from the others and hastened to explain, "I woke up in the middle of last night when I was still blind and there was a living..._something_ beneath my head. I could hear its heartbeat. When it knew I was awake, it ran for it. I heard what sounded like claws scraping against the bed, but the door never opened."

"Thus," Billy concluded, "this particular alien or helpful ally is using an entrance that doesn't involve the door."

"Then you're saying there's a hidden way out of this room?" Zack asked, just to clarify. "Wow, that could really come in handy."

"So finish your story, Jason," Kimberly urged. "What about the memory you have now?"

Jason took a deep breath. "I gotta warn you guys, it's brutal. I mean, beyond horror movie brutal."

"Jason, we're not little kids," Trini said a bit sternly, but she softened her tone. He looked haunted by what he could see in the depths of his mind's eye. This was the first she'd heard about the memory, however. What was it like to recall something that couldn't possibly have happened in your life?

Billy was hunting for a fresh writing utensil and some clean sheets of paper on which to take notes when Azalea stood up suddenly and shut the analysis screen off. She gave no sign that she had understood a word of their current conversation as she started for the doorway connecting to the kitchen. About halfway there, the small girl swayed slightly and had to pause and regain her balance.

As if unaware she was the center of attention, Azalea kept going, made it to the door, and activated a communication device in the next room. She began a hushed conversation in her sibilant language, and even though Jason followed and attempted to eavesdrop from the doorway, he couldn't understand anything.

He turned back and met the questioning glances of his friends. Jason had to shrug, indicating his incomprehension without tipping Azalea off as to his presence. Opting to leave her alone for the moment, Jason went back to the others and without further preamble launched into the best account he could provide of the strange, alien world he had witnessed through the eyes of a child.

Almost as he expected, the girls expressed their horror far more verbally than the guys. Billy, though he was taking the most detailed notes he possibly could, found his eyes blurred by tears as he saw the bruised and broken bodies of people he would never meet littering a fire lit camp.

Zack was uncharacteristically solemn and silent throughout. At one point he almost wanted to cover his ears, but even that wouldn't erase the truth of what Jason had seen. Tommy's hands were over his face and his loose hair spilled forward, hiding his true emotions. Only Kimberly, with her hand on his shoulder, felt the way he trembled as he listened.

"And then I woke up," Jason finished. "I _was_ the girl. I mean, for the first few minutes I wasn't sure if I had the right number of fingers." There was a long, uneasy moment of silence that seemed to stretch on for an hour. Finally, Jason knew he had to break it. "Guys, we can't let this happen to Earth. We've got to make a plan and get out of here."

"You don't get it, do you?" These were the first words to come out of Tommy's mouth since the group meeting had begun. "That little girl that you were…its Azalea."

That revelation fell like a bombshell into the midst of the other five Rangers. "What?" Kimberly demanded, straightening up so fast that she winced and pressed her hand to her side.

"How can you be sure?" That conclusion hadn't even crossed Jason's mind. Of course, relating those terrible events to what he saw in this clean, well-lit environment had been the furthest thing from his thoughts, especially while trying to take care of the others.

"Earlier, I saw a burn on the back of her neck," Tommy explained. "It's below her collar, where it sounds like it should be. And the handprint…I know how she got that."

Trini's eyes narrowed. "What do you mean, Tommy? Jason just told us how it happened."

Tommy raised his head; his face looked haggard and old. "Not that one. The one on her hand. I don't know how, but—"

"—you have these images that you couldn't possibly have seen before, and it seems like you could almost have imagined it, but the memory of the pain is too real," Jason said steadily. He focused on Tommy. "That's how it feels, right?"

The White Ranger nodded almost helplessly.

"I don't get it," Zack said. "I mean, how did she get these memories into your heads? _Why_ is she doing it?" He craned his neck in a vain attempt to see out of the doorway, to see the little girl whose past was becoming a part of them.

"Perhaps she is not performing such acts on purpose," Billy said quietly. "In fact, Azalea may not be responsible at all."

"What's the theory this time, Billy?" Trini's question wasn't asked unkindly; she wanted any good reason to believe that Azalea wasn't working with the aliens. Trini could see no logical basis for the girl to have loyalty to the World-Burners other than pure fear. But if she had access to the mind-manipulation device, was she the one that had erased their memories initially?

"What if the aliens gave us the memories as a warning?" Billy asked. "Even our unknown ally could be involved. Due to Azalea's memory that Jason possesses, we have an idea know what will happen to Earth if we do not act quickly." He looked around at all of them. "I maintain the theory that anyone could have planted those memories in Jason and Tommy, not just Azalea."

Kimberly was dubious. "Wouldn't they have sensed something?"

Jason laughed shortly. "I spent I don't know how long unconscious. I mean, one moment Trini's sticking a needle in my arm and the next, I'm in a fish bowl."

"I'm with Jase," Tommy said. "I'm not sure how long those aliens had me in the white room, but anything could have happened in there and I wouldn't have known."

Kimberly exchanged glances with Trini. This could be the opening they needed to get Tommy to talk. "What white room, Tommy?" she asked. Her boyfriend tensed up suddenly, almost like he'd said too much.

"Everyone's spilling what they know," Jason said. "Go ahead, bro. We're here to listen." He hated seeing Tommy, one of the strongest people he knew, jumping at shadows.

Tommy swept the room with his gaze before running both hands through his hair. "You're all real, right? I know—I know I sound crazy, but I've got to be sure." A great sense of dread was rising inside him, as if all he saw was a dream waiting to shatter. Everything seemed to be slowly returning to normal, and the room was even in focus now, but every once in awhile there would be a telltale flicker of movement that mutated into something unreal. Like when Jason had tried to shake hands and his arm had turned into a snake. The vision had lasted only a split second, so fast that Tommy might not have noticed, but his tortured senses were on edge and he couldn't seem to turn them down.

Of course, that hadn't been a bad thing when Kimberly had started what she called 'therapy with a kiss' or in this case, many consecutive kisses. That was something he could remember; something that he didn't think could be faked by any alien illusion. And Trini, Zack, Billy, and Jason...they had shown themselves friendly so far. This was reality. Nothing could take its place.

Almost before he knew it, Tommy began his story with leaving their quarters and seeing the hallways of the alien ships for the first time. He tried to let the words come naturally, without thinking about what he was saying, but he got hung up on the first putty fight. He could still remember the weight of Kimberly's broken body in his arms, and the way her lips had curled into a sneer when she'd said, 'No choice but to kill you.'

"I'm right here," came the real Kimberly's voice from beside him. "Whatever you saw, just remember that I'm here."

He pressed forward with that thought. Tommy recounted the run-in with himself at Angel Grove High School, the strange Command Center, the river of colors, and finally, the shape-changing tiger. He was sure dozens of other things had happened, but like a nightmare, the less memorable portions had faded into scattered images.

"You didn't know how right you were, Jase," Zack said when Tommy had finished. "It sounds just like the Island of Illusion."

"No, it was several times worse," Tommy said. "It had no end, no real flow, and nothing I could use for absolute reference."

Billy was still adding notations to the fifth piece of paper he'd used to record Tommy's account. "Of course," he said once he was done. "By disturbing your body's perceptions, the aliens effectively removed what you knew to be true from your experience. Gravity, for example. Simulating a change in gravity disrupts equilibrium as well as denying the brain an understandable reference point for interpreting data."

"Trini, a translation?" Zack asked.

Trini rolled her eyes but complied. "Basically, by taking away the trust you put in your senses, it's much easier to wear down the mind's defenses. It makes you paranoid."

"What I want to know about is the extra memory you've got," Jason said. "How does it fit in with Billy's master theory?"

Billy started to object to the classification of his many hypotheses, but was distracted by Tommy's flat refusal.

"No. It's just—I can't right now, not with my brain going haywire." The White Ranger lapsed into a miserable silence. It was hard to explain exactly why. Perhaps it was his own encounter with people he loved being used against him, or the burning desire he'd felt from an alien child that he understood so well, having a history of adoption himself. He couldn't shake the feelings Azalea's memory gave him; they were too much a part of him now. Maybe when the tense atmosphere had cleared a little Tommy could find words to express everything.

Jason, realizing that the conversation needed sudden guidance away from Tommy, asked, "Anything new about the computer, Billy?"

"Unfortunately, negative." Billy sighed. "Without an alphabetical or phonemic translation, I fear I have reached an impasse for the moment."

"He needs Azalea's help," Trini clarified, directing a significant glance toward the next room.

"Well, then I'd say it's about time we asked for it," Kim said firmly. "We'll be right back, Billy. Just take a minute and look at the blood analyzing machine, would you? Azalea was using it earlier; Trini can fill you in." With that, she stood up, snatched Jason by the arm, and led the way into the next room, where Azalea was still deep in conversation with a hooded figure.

Now that Kimberly knew what to look for, she could just make out the moist texture of the alien's skin and the large, opaque eyes. The World-Burner caught sight of the humans and barked a sharp word, which made Azalea jerk around with a gasp and cut the connection. She appeared to wilt suddenly, and her features became exhausted again. Had she been acting in front of the World-Burners? Or had she been acting in front of the Rangers?

"Azalea," Kim said as if she hadn't noticed a thing, "we need your help with something."

The young girl looked at the Pink Ranger for a long moment as if processing her words. _"Kassa?"_ she asked after several seconds, standing up.

"Can you help Billy translate the computer link? It's really important," Jason said, pointing to the round screen. The scrolling white lines of script had returned to the blue background. "Azalea, can you help him?" he repeated, looking for signs of comprehension.

Azalea was looking at Jason, but she didn't appear to be listening. She blinked once, slowly as if she wasn't seeing straight. Then, appearing to realize that she'd just been asked a question, she tried to answer but no sound came out.

Kimberly, who as a teenager had seen more girls pass out than any of the others, dove forward and caught Azalea just as she started to fall. The small girl collapsed bonelessly and Kim was careful to avoid touching her skin just as a precaution. She gestured for Jason to help her lift Azalea onto the nearest chair, and then covered her with a blanket.

"What's wrong?" Jason asked. "You don't think the aliens are experimenting on her too?"

Kim darted a glance over her shoulder at Tommy, just visible through the doorway. "That's the last thing we need." She shook her head despairingly. "If Azalea can't continue to help us, what will we do then?"

Just then, Billy came into the room. He had his miniature book under one arm and a single sheet in his hand as if he had a question, but when he saw the looks on his friends' faces, he asked, "What happened?"

"Azalea just passed out," Kim reported. "We're not sure but...do you think the aliens are messing with her?"

Billy thought back to the description Trini and Zack had given of the blood sample Azalea had taken from herself. Something was nagging at him, something... "Kimberly, could you examine the skin where Azalea extracted her own blood?"

Though Kim thought the request a little odd, she knelt beside Azalea and pulled aside the blanket enough to lift the edge of her black shirt. And then she gasped. "Oh my gosh."

"What?" Jason and Billy asked in unison. In answer, Kimberly moved out of their line of vision, removing the blanket altogether and rolling up Azalea's shirt to see the extent of the damage.

A large, greenish-purple bruise covered the little girl's hip. It was approximately a little bigger than Kimberly's palm and dotted with dark red puncture wounds. Some of the wounds were on top of each other, some were half-healed, and many were scarred over.

"I'd say that the aliens definitely had something to do with this," Jason said when he found his voice. "But why? She's their helper, right? It doesn't make sense."

Billy knelt down, careful not to touch Azalea, and examined the large contusion. "Kimberly, do you recall where Azalea retrieved her advanced hypodermic needle from?" At Kim's nod, he asked, "Could you get one for me? I need it for comparison."

Before Kimberly got as far as the doorway, the outer door to the rest of the alien ship irised open to reveal two of the tall World-Burners. Their hoods hid their features, but Billy and Jason spotted scaly, five-fingered hands as the two aliens raised some type of weapon and took aim.

Ranger instincts on full alert, Jason threw himself to one side and rolled, coming up with the intent to kick the weapon out of the alien on the left's hand. Billy went after the alien on the right with uncharacteristic initiative, flinging several of his papers into its face before diving at its midsection.

"Tommy, help us!" Kimberly shouted, seizing the chance to escape by dodging past the two aliens and through the still-open doorway. She was confronted with the airlock chamber, the far door sealed tight. _I probably have to close the other door in order to get out of here,_ she thought. _I can't leave the others behind, and I'll get nowhere by myself._

Frustrated, Kim took her emotions out on Billy's alien, hitting it with a kick to the back and sending it sprawling. It was in that instant that she saw the reptilian tail snake out from beneath the World-Burner's robe and catch Billy behind the knees, sweeping him off his feet. Billy landed hard, the wind momentarily knocked out of him. While he was down, the alien adjusted its grip on its weapon and fired at Kimberly. She somersaulted out of the way and attempted to pin the alien.

"Jason, watch its tail!" she warned, rolling to one side as her own alien tried to hit her with the aforementioned appendage.

Jason heard her advice just in time to avoid being brained. He was reminded of his old Tyrannosaurus 'zord's movements as he ducked and came up to the left of his alien. Its weapon was lost under one of the chairs, but Jason had almost forgotten about the aliens' burning body temperature. Their robes protected him from most of the heat, but if they managed to touch him skin to skin, the contact would probably burn him in a second. "Kim, don't let them touch you!" he yelled back. And then over his shoulder he called, "Tommy, man, we could use your help!"

Tommy rose from his chair and walked slowly toward the doorway, his eyes focused on the struggle of his friends. Zack was on his feet, hovering in the doorway but unable to be of any help. Trini was sitting up, trying to see what was happening but still without enough strength to stand. _It's up to you to help them fight,_ part of Tommy's mind said. _You've got to stop this,_ another part of him warned._ If you don't, they'll end up just like Azalea when she was tricked._ That part came from the memory that wasn't his, motivated purely by childish preservation.

"Jason, stop!" Tommy shouted over the melee. "They just want Azalea. That's all."

Billy was back up and fighting again, trying to distract the second alien who had managed to buck Kimberly off of its back and trap her against the wall. "How can you be certain?" the Blue Ranger asked, blocking a strike before attempting to knock the alien off-balance in order to try pinning it again.

"The memory," Tommy answered. Zack was practically fighting in place next to him, throwing his own punches and wincing every time one of their friends was hit.

"Man, you're gonna have to do better than that," the Black Ranger said harshly, upset that while he couldn't do anything Tommy was just going to stand there and let the others take on the World-Burners alone.

Desperation made Tommy say what he hadn't been able to say before: "Look, another group of people just like us tried to hold Azalea hostage once. They wanted to use her against the World-Burners, but the World-Burners fought back. They killed one of the people, the one primarily responsible for the plan. Please," Tommy said, "just back away."

The fight had ground to a halt in front of him. Jason was still facing his own alien, chest heaving from all the dodging he'd had to do in order to keep from getting burned. Kim was frozen on the floor, one arm raised to protect her face while Billy stood over her in a defensive stance.

"You're sure, Tommy?" Jason asked, his tone of voice implying that if he wasn't sure bad things were going to happen in the near future.

"Yeah. Yeah, I'm sure," Tommy replied firmly. "Walk away. Don't turn your backs, but walk away." And then, suddenly recalling what Azalea had done in the presence of a World-Burner, he added, "Show them the backs of your necks; bow your heads. I think it's a gesture of submission."

Carefully, one by one, Billy, Jason, and Kimberly raised their hands in surrender and did as Tommy said, each lowering their heads just enough to expose their necks for a few seconds. _"Lemmas," _Billy said, but got no visible response. The two World-Burners remained where they were, long tails flexing slowly.

_To be continued_

_Language Translations:_

_Kassa: What?_

_Lemmas: Sorry._

Reviews hoarded! (No seriously, I keep them in my email inbox for weeks.)

Author's Note: Yay! I actually got my latest teaser in the next chapter like I was supposed to! Now let's see if I can do it with this next one...

Thanks to my reviewers (in order of appearance):

Sam (Fae) whose reviews are progressive.

Cmar whose reviews make my muse bounce happily.

Ice-Princess-Amber, who was so right about Tommy.

Dagmar Buse whose name I stared at in shock (THE Dagmar Buse? Aaaah!).

Rapunzl, who raised some important questions that I hope I answered.

Jps1926, who was the first to comment on the teaser.

ShadowMaria whom I believe is a newcomer; welcome. 

DeviousNevius to whom I am not fair.

_Next time on Power Rangers!_

"Jason!"

"Mmm?"

"Jason, wake up!" Kimberly shook his shoulder harder. She didn't know at what point he'd fallen asleep last night, but he was definitely taking a long time to get with the program.

"Whaz th' matter?" Jason asked, rolling over and rubbing his eyes. All in all, they'd had a pretty calm night; everyone was present, nobody's life seemed to be in mortal danger...

"Billy's gone."

That made him sit up straight. "He's gone?"

Kimberly nodded. "And what's more, I saw the thing that's been helping us out." She did a couple stretches to prove her point. "My ribs are good as new, and _I saw it."_

"It?" Jason repeated, trying to clear his head and think straight.

Kim was adamant. "It's an animal, Jase."


	12. Once Betrayed

Disclaimer: While I was hoping to get a little something extra for my birthday, it didn't include MMPR, which is still owned by Saban/Disney.

**Impending Darkness**

Chapter Twelve

For several long moments in which time seemed to slow to a near halt, neither side moved, other than the World-Burners' tails and the little sideways glances the humans were trading as they waited for something to happen. Jason, Billy, and Kimberly had backed toward the door, their heads semi-bowed so they could still watch the aliens. Now the five teenagers were clustered in the connecting doorway, blocking Trini's view of what was going on. She remained silent, unable to miss the tension in the air and the defensive stances her friends were taking.

Jason was the first to break the silence. "What now, Tommy?" he muttered over his shoulder from his half-bent position. When the White Ranger didn't reply immediately, Zack nudged him.

"I don't know. The memory—well, it doesn't end well, and the outcome was completely different," Tommy said in a stage whisper.

"If we're not careful, it'll have exactly the same ending," Zack warned.

Apparently satisfied with the distance and the Rangers' inaction, Jason's alien moved forward and scooped up its weapon from where it had fallen beneath a chair in the initial scuffle. Billy and Kim's alien continued to cover the prisoners as the first alien directed the barrel of its firearm towards the limp form of Azalea, still in the middle ground. There was a strange humming noise, and Kimberly made a small noise before biting her tongue. She knew that sound...

Blue energy arcs sizzled down the length of the weapon, and the alien fired a blue beam right at the small girl. Just as Kim had described it, flickering blue manacles formed themselves around Azalea's wrists and ankles. A couple adjustments to the device and the World-Burner lifted the alien child into the air. Her dark hair obscured her face as the aliens retreated from the room, sealing the airlock behind them. Only then did the six Rangers dare to begin breathing again.

For a few moments, they all tried to recover their wits. Trini waited as patiently as she could, wanting to know what exactly had transpired, but Zack beat her to the first question.

The Black Ranger rounded on Tommy. "All right, come clean. We had a fighting chance to escape and you messed it up. What's going on?"

"Zack!" Kimberly exclaimed, startled at the angry expression on his face. "It's not his fault. We wouldn't have been able to go anywhere without you and Trini anyway."

For an instant, Zack looked even more furious, but then he sighed. His shoulders slumped and a look of shame took the place of anger. "I'm sorry, Tommy," he apologized after a long moment. "I'm just going nuts locked up like this."

"Be thankful you haven't been taken out of the room," Jason said. "I'm beginning to think that the World-Burners only want us taken out so they can..."

"Experiment upon our physiology," Billy completed, sighing heavily. There, he'd said it for all of them to hear. The others nodded grimly; at this point, there wasn't much evidence to contradict him.

"That means that whenever we're together, we've got to keep each other caught up on what's happened," Zack pressed. "Otherwise we're gonna lose track of who knows what."

A chill crept down Tommy's spine. He sensed where this was going even before Jason said, "So far we know everything that there is to know, except for the computer link and Tommy's extra memory." Tommy looked up to see Jason's eyes on him. "Bro, will you tell us what you saw?"

Tommy dropped his gaze and looked at the floor for a moment, trying to find the courage he'd always had before. Where was the power that had carried him through so many battles? He didn't know. And then suddenly, the face of a white tiger was looking up at him from the spongy carpet. He saw the same kind brown eyes in a proud face, just as he had in the white room. _I am your protection,_ he seemed to sense once again. _I have kept you safe. Will you now keep your friends safe?_

A new sense of strength seemed to build within him. He was the _White Ranger._ It had taken Zedd a good long while to drain him of his Green Ranger powers, and Tommy wasn't going to let a bunch of pyro-maniacal aliens get away with defeating him and the others in one shot. Not while he had the chance to do something about it. And that something was going to happen right now.

Tommy raised his head and looked Jason straight in the eye. A slow smile spread across the Red Ranger's face, and he raised one hand. Tommy caught it with his own in a tight, determined grip. "Let's get started; it's a long story," Tommy said.

"He's back," Kim said with a happy little bounce that ended up as a hug. Tommy embraced her fiercely and swung her around once just for emphasis. Trini and Zack exchanged a high five, while Billy hurried to pick up his scattered notes from the other room.

Three minutes later, Trini and Zack were sitting up on their beds. Kim was straddling the end of Trini's bunk, while Jason, Billy, and Tommy settled themselves in the chairs around the small table.

"It must have been while Azalea was still new to the ship," Tommy began, trying to establish an exact context. "She was still having trouble understanding the alien language. Also, she was hoping Anassa—her mom, I think—was still alive somewhere, somehow."

"Wait," Kimberly interrupted. "I thought Jason said that she knew her entire world was gone."

Jason nodded. "She knew that in her head," he replied.

"You remember what it's like when you're a little kid, though, right?" Zack asked. "Seeing is believing."

"Exactly," Tommy agreed. "Azalea didn't see Anassa's body on the planet."

"So it was easier to pretend that her mother was still alive?" Trini asked.

Billy was quick to answer. "Of course. The mind seeks to create positive constructs in order to maintain balance in the face of overwhelming odds."

"Then you're saying Azalea was hanging onto whatever hope she could?" Kimberly translated slowly.

"Affirmative," Billy said. Kimberly grinned slightly at her own successful interpretation of geek.

"The memory starts with Azalea opening a door..." Tommy continued, letting the images return to his mind's eye.

He watched as a small, four-fingered hand opened a familiar-looking panel and entered an access code. He recognized the doorway and then the room beyond as the door opened: the same white round room that had almost destroyed his sense of reality.

Tommy knew he was a passenger in this memory; it was a similar feeling to when Rita had enslaved his conscious will in order to fill him with her evil Green Ranger powers. He was a spectator to the actions going on in front of him.

A tall creature was waiting in the center of the room, apparently unaffected by whatever had gone on. Had it had the same mind-bending treatment as Tommy? If so, it was certainly handling the mental assault much better.

The new alien was about the size and shape of an adult human. Based on Azalea's previous knowledge, Tommy knew that this alien was a 'he' and his name was Thyrdyr. In fact, it was almost odd...Azalea liked Thyrdyr. No, she was hopeful about something, but she wasn't specifically thinking about it, so all he could pick up was a general feeling.

_Hello Haschen, _Thyrdyr thought to Azalea. A small smile appeared on his face, momentarily distorting the feathery shape of the white tattoo stretching from the corner of his left eye to the edge of his mouth. At closer glance, it was almost like he was permanently crying but the thought he'd given to Azalea didn't feel sad.

_He's a telepath,_ Tommy realized as Azalea summoned up a thought for Thyrdyr to read. She wanted to know if he was all right. Worry laced the thought and Thyrdyr mentally patted her head before reassuring her.

_These planet-eaters cannot easily manipulate the mind of a Sylvi,_ he told her. _We have been trained to resist these kinds of attacks._

A brief sense of relief washed over Azalea as she turned to lead Thyrdyr back to the holding quarters. Tommy already knew the way, because it was exactly the same door leading into the rooms the Rangers shared now. As Azalea cycled the different locks, her mind drifted to a faint idea that Tommy could only just catch...

_The Sylvi resemble me very closely. If they can escape..._

She didn't have time to complete the idea, however, as the inner door to the holding quarters opened and Azalea's eyes locked onto the one person she'd hoped but never thought she'd see again.

Anassa rose gracefully from one of the short stools the aliens were using instead of chairs. Her once-tan skin was pale from lack of sunlight, but her long, dark hair fell over one shoulder just as Azalea remembered it. It brought back a flash of a memory: Anassa sitting outside their tent, working on a clay pot with her strong hands.

"Anassa!" The word burst from the little girl, and the other Sylvi in the room smiled, touching a single finger to their noses in a gesture of tolerant understanding. Tommy grasped the meaning from a distant part of Azalea's mind: emotional outbursts were the sign of an untrained child. The Sylvi looked upon Azalea's joy with a sentiment similar to 'one day she'll know better, bless her heart.'

Azalea ran to her mother but forced herself to pull up short of a hug. She couldn't hurt Anassa. _If they did the same to her, she could hurt me, too._ Tommy understood that thought, just before Azalea and Anassa began a rapid-fire conversation in their own language. The exchange was so quick that Tommy only picked up what Azalea was thinking.

_The Fire-Eaters have been keeping her in a different part of the ship. She thinks the Sylvi might be able to escape if we help them. But we'll get caught...not if we do it right now? What can I do—help with the computer. Yes, I read most of it, but will the Sylvi take us with them? You're sure...yes, I will._

The thoughts were quick, sporadic, and scattered as Thyrdyr pointed to the round computer interface. Tommy couldn't be sure, but he thought the screen was a different shade of blue. The World-Burners had probably upgraded it between this memory and the present.

Azalea went to work. She selected five of the scrolling symbols and the screen blanked for a moment before more symbols appeared. Thyrdyr and the other Sylvi gathered behind her as she allowed them to read her thoughts.

_This is a picture of the inside of the ship._ Azalea moved a three-dimensional image around, rotating it to point out where they were now and where they could go.

_Good,_ Thyrdyr thought. _What is the easiest way to destroy this ship? We must ensure that our planet is not attacked._

Azalea rotated the view of the ship, tracing a route with her finger. _Here is the power room. There are a lot of important things in there. Hurting any one of them is bad._

Thyrdyr exchanged a triumphant look with one of his companions, a woman named Belyn. Her eyes narrowed and she smiled smugly. That instantly set Tommy on edge, but Azalea was so happy at seeing her mother and being given a chance at a new life that she dismissed the expression.

_And where can we find hand weapons?_ Thyrdyr pressed, clasping hands with his lifemate, Nyrna. Both of them were nearly quivering with excitement.

_Azalea, don't help them!_ Tommy wanted to shout the warning, but he knew that she couldn't hear him. His eyes fell upon the straight, strong fingers of Azalea's left hand as she moved them over the interface in a rapid dance, pointing out the destination Thyrdyr had requested. _She shouldn't have to pay this price,_ he thought sadly.

Each of the five Sylvi took turns memorizing the route they would take through the World-Burners' ship. Five...it was that observation that finally alerted Azalea to any suspicious behavior. _Where is Hyina? _she thought to the Sylvi. A sudden frown crossed Anassa's face.

Verbally, Azalea questioned her mother as to what was wrong; Anassa shouldn't have been able to hear the thought.

_Hyina is sleeping,_ Thyrdyr answered quickly. Too quickly. _Nyrna will wake her now, if you will open the door. We must not waste time. _Nyrna rose and went into the connecting room.

Even so, Azalea hesitated. She repeated her question to Anassa. Tommy caught her thoughts:

_Something _is_ wrong, but you're not telling me what. I stand to lose as much as you—yes, speed is the only thing on our side. But...Anassa..._

Anassa barked a few choice words at her daughter, wounding Azalea's feelings. The words got her moving, however, and within a few moments, the Sylvi, Anassa, and Azalea were inside the too-warm antechamber waiting for the lock to finish cycling. The six-pointed door opened, and Azalea suddenly froze. No less than twelve World-Burners were waiting for them, holding familiar-looking energy weapons.

"What are you doing?" one of the aliens demanded of Azalea in its hissing language. "Didn't you think we'd see your system access?" Tommy had to listen carefully to Azalea's thoughts in order to pick up the meaning; she was still struggling with the language herself.

A sharp, searing pain across her right shoulder blade made the little girl scream and spin around. The Sylvi had opened their razor-sharp wings, shredding the backs of their shirts which normally hid the lethal weapons from view. Sudden, blinding hate washed over her mind in crackling red waves and Azalea flinched, dropping instinctively to the floor to avoid being trampled in the battle.

Someone snaked an arm around her chest and lifted her bodily to face the World-Burners. The violent, malicious thoughts behind the words Anassa hurled at the aliens was enough to make Azalea struggle against her mother. It was impossible for her to miss the meaning: _Grant us passage and we will not kill your despicable little slave. _She shouldn't have been able to hear the thoughts, but she did.

_No! This isn't right; it can't be real! Anassa, what are you doing?!_ Around them, the other Sylvi were striking out at the aliens holding them captive. They spun, slicing with their wings, but to no avail. The blue energy weapons subdued them one by one.

"Release your hold on the servant's mind," one of the World-Burners ordered. "We will kill you if you do not obey."

Anassa snarled at them in reply, backing up a step. Now desperate, Azalea kicked out against her, trying to make the woman she thought was her mother lose her grip. Tears were running down her face, hot tears of betrayal. Her thoughts were a maelstrom of confusion, fear, and sadness.

The one sensation that overrode all of that came when a World-Burner seized her left hand in a crushing grip. The intense heat from the touch flashed up her arm and the little girl stiffened in agony, screaming. The World-Burner yanked hard; Tommy felt the delicate bones in Azalea's hand crack as 'Anassa' fought to maintain her hold.

Suddenly, the World-Burner's tail flashed by Azalea's blurred vision, striking 'Anassa' hard at the base of her neck. She crumpled instantly, and Azalea found herself pressed against the warm robes of the World-Burner that still had her by the left hand. The lizard-like alien dropped her immediately, and Azalea flopped to the ground, weak and exhausted. She looked up just in time to see the woman—Anassa—disappear. Instead, the body of Hyina took her place, neck broken where the World-Burner had struck her.

Azalea began to sob uncontrollably. She had seen her last hope fail; her mother would not come for her. She had been tricked by the very people she thought would take her in if she helped them escape.

She didn't fight the blue energy that immobilized her limbs. She understood that she deserved to be punished. Fire still burned in her left hand and Azalea could tell that was broken beyond hope of natural repair. Tommy couldn't help but wince and block the image her eyes showed him of her hand: reddish-white blistered skin and three crooked fingers. He couldn't block the pain she felt, however.

Pulling himself out of the memory, Tommy flexed his own fingers to ensure that they were unharmed. He caught Billy doing the same thing with his burned hands, his notes forgotten. Zack was rubbing the space his middle finger should have occupied on his own left hand. Then he drew his leg up and crossed his arms over his knee before leaning forward, hiding his face from view. Jason looked faintly sickened, and his jaw worked as he fought to keep his true emotions from showing.

Kim had her arms wrapped around her legs, and she too had buried her face so the others wouldn't see her horrified reaction to Tommy's memory. Trini's hands were clenched in her lap as if she were physically trying to hold herself together.

Nobody spoke for several long moments. Tommy concentrated on his friends' faces, needing to see the confirmation of his own fears. They were just as unnerved and stunned as he had been when he'd first discovered the memory.

Trini was the one who spoke first. "Do you think she's given up on that dream?" Her dark eyes searched Tommy's. "The dream of a home?"

He had to raise his shoulders in an agitated shrug. "I don't know. There wasn't anything else that I felt from her aside from just the memory."

"You want to take her back to Earth with us," Jason said in understanding.

"And why shouldn't we?" Kimberly asked, resting her chin on her knees. "She's still got fight in her; I saw it in her eyes when she took Tommy. The World-Burners haven't broken her spirit—"

"—they've just made her hide it," Tommy said, recalling the gesture Azalea had made to him right before leaving him alone in the white room. "She's more cautious than ever."

"But wouldn't the fact that she's not a human kind of mess up her chances of fitting in?" Zack asked slowly. He looked at Billy, their resident expert on extraterrestrials.

The Blue Ranger rolled his pencil between his fingers as he thought. "It is doubtful that Zordon and Alpha would not know of some solution to the situation," he said. "Perhaps there is a way for them to see if the _Eys Sylmai_ survive elsewhere in the universe."

"Azalea's not our main problem right now," Jason said, trying to refocus the other Rangers' attention. "Our problem is going to be escaping before Earth gets cooked up for lunch." He said it harsher than he'd intended, but no one corrected him. They knew they needed to keep their attention on the big picture.

"Tommy, do you believe you could write the symbols Azalea used from the interface?" Billy asked. "They might provide a starting point for interpreting the computer script."

Tommy brought that section of the memory to his mind's eye, even as he reached for the pencil Billy was holding. Slowly, and without looking at the paper, he sketched the five symbols. Only when he had finished did Tommy inspect his work. Then he went back over the alien script again, darkening the strokes to better match what he remembered.

Billy watched closely, memorizing the characters in the event that the aliens were to destroy the hard copy or modify Tommy's memory again. He recognized two of the symbols already—they were numbers.

The White Ranger then sketched a lopsided circle and marked five dots, numbering them as he went. "That's where the symbols were on the screen when Azalea got into the computer before," Tommy explained. "But I'm almost sure the screen is different now."

"Nevertheless, you have provided adequate data for another attempt at decoding the user interface," Billy said eagerly, taking the sheet of paper. He moved toward the doorway, obviously itching to get to work.

"He's going to take another shot at the computer," Trini said immediately, earning a chorus of 'ahs' from the others.

"It may require several minutes of analysis," Billy warned as Jason, Kimberly, and Tommy moved to follow him. The trio paused and exchanged glances. Kimberly looked back over her shoulder, only to see Zack going after the makeshift playing cards. Trini was glaring at him silently as he hopped back and forth. Zack, sensing the invisible daggers radiating from her eyes, offered her the cards with a sheepish grin.

"You can pick the game?" he tried, but the Yellow Ranger's look only sharpened to a level approaching Jason's Power Sword.

"'Scuse me," Kim said, sliding between Trini and her target. She plucked the deck from her best friend's hand. "Go Fish, anyone?"

Her death glare interrupted, Trini appeared to enter normal reality again. Zack, as unobtrusively as he could, hoisted himself back up on his own bed and tried to make himself as small as possible. "Sure, Go Fish sounds great," he agreed readily, keeping the Pink Ranger between himself and Trini's line of sight.

Kim settled on her bed and shuffled the cards by mixing them around in front of her, six-year-old style. Then, with a flourish, she gathered them back up and began to deal their hands.

Meanwhile, Tommy was hovering behind Billy, studying the scrolling characters on the interface in the slim hope that it would somehow look familiar. Jason had helped himself to a glass of soda, but as the minutes dragged on with no progress, he began to get antsy. The brief struggle with the World-Burners had awoken the need for action. That was how he thought best and handled frustration.

Turning, Jason went to the connecting doorway between the two round rooms and began evaluating floor space. If he moved the round table and its chairs up against the wall of the infirmary...

"You guys mind if I do some katas?" he asked the Go Fish players. Kimberly paused in the act of delivering Trini's cards to a suddenly-stiff Zack.

"No," she replied as Zack slowly laid down all four queens.

"I'll try not to get too jealous," the Black Ranger said, rearranging his remaining cards with exaggerated care. "Kim, you got any threes?" The question was casual, but Jason hadn't been Zack's best friend since second grade not to know what he was thinking.

He went over to Zack and snatched the cards out of his fingers before Zack had a chance to react. "I think we need to talk," he said firmly. "Look man, I know that your leg has got you down, but you're not out of this game. If I don't have you with me—and not just me, but all of us—we're nothing."

Somewhere behind him, Kimberly had carefully removed the strange IV from below Trini's collarbone and was assisting her toward the doorway. They sealed the door behind themselves and left Jason and Zack alone.

Zack didn't meet Jason's gaze as the Red Ranger continued, "You've got to stop taking your anger out on the rest of us. We're not your enemies, _they_ are." Jason pointed in the direction of the main airlock.

"I _know_," Zack interrupted, clenching his hands in frustration. "And they're going after you guys one by one while I sit here and watch you come back with strange memories and more pain. I want to take some of it. I want to share the problems with you so it won't hurt so much." The Black Ranger stared earnestly at his oldest friend, the agony of his true feelings evident in his gaze. Jason didn't know what to say.

"Aah, I'm sorry man," Zack said before Jason could form a reply. "You don't need this right now." He leaned back, rubbing his face with his hands as if to erase what he'd been thinking.

Jason found he had to clear his throat in order to be able to speak. "You're wrong, bro. You're just looking out for us." He didn't know what else to say; the atmosphere was uncertain enough without adding empty promises that Jason wasn't sure could be fulfilled.

Zack decided that there was nothing more to say between friends. He offered Jason a half-smile. "So, does Trini have any threes?"

Jason had no choice but to smile and laugh. He checked the Yellow Ranger's discarded hand. "Jackpot," he said, handing Zack two cards.

"How about some good old-fashioned blackjack?" Zack said, changing the subject. "Loser has to eat the worst meal we find at breakfast."

"You're on," Jason said, gathering up the cards.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Sometime in the wee hours of the morning, a voice interrupted the uneasy dreams of the Red Ranger.

"Jason!"

"Mmm?"

"Jason, wake up!" Kimberly shook his shoulder harder. She didn't know at what point he'd fallen asleep last night after playing fifty-odd hands of cards with Zack, but he was definitely taking a long time to get with the program.

"Whaz th' matter?" Jason asked, rolling over and rubbing his eyes. All in all, they'd had a pretty calm night; everyone was present, no news to report on the interface as yet, however...

"Billy's gone."

That made him sit up straight. "He's gone?"

Kimberly nodded. "And what's more, I saw the thing that's been helping us out." She did a couple stretches to prove her point. "My ribs are good as new, and _I saw it."_

"It?" Jason repeated, trying to clear his head and think straight.

Kim was adamant. "It's an animal, Jase."

Jason tried to focus, but what Kimberly had just said still didn't register. "A...what?"

"An animal," she repeated. "It looks kind of like a fox with really big ears, but the fur was dark brown with a little bit of white on the face and paws." Kimberly measured a rough size in the air with her hands. "It wasn't very big...like a large house cat or something."

"When did you see it?" Jason asked, glancing around now that he'd rubbed the sleep from his eyes.

"About fifteen minutes ago," Kim said, momentary excitement alive in her eyes. Jason didn't blame her; this could be one more clue to the mystery of escape. "And its just like Zack said," she continued, "there is a _forcefield_ of some kind that holds us down. I don't know if the fox-cat turned it on or not, but I couldn't do anything."

Jason thought aloud, "I don't think it can, because I could still move when it was healing my eyes...maybe the aliens can control it remotely."

By that time, their conversation had awoken Trini, who brushed her dark hair out of her eyes and sat up slowly. She took stock of the room before asking the inevitable: "Where's Billy?"

"He was taken sometime last night," Kim answered, worry taking the place of excitement. "I didn't see him leave."

"This is so confusing," Jason said with a sigh. He ran a hand through his already-mussed hair. "We're awake for some things but not for others?"

"Remember the time difference," Trini said. "They could be taking advantage of when we're asleep by keeping us that way so we won't create problems."

"Like yesterday with Azalea," Jason said, a hint of bitterness in his voice. "Man, I wish we could've beaten those guys."

"We'll get a chance," Kimberly said, striving to be positive. At the look Jason gave her, she hastened to explain, "With the fox-cat helping us, we'll be healthy enough to escape when the opportunity comes again." She looked pointedly at the still-sleeping forms of Zack and Tommy. "We couldn't have done it before. Not with them the way they were."

Jason nodded after a long pause. As their leader, he had to keep all their needs in mind. Sometimes, though, it helped to have others remind him of the obvious. "Where are Billy's notes?" he asked.

"Out in the living area," Trini answered. Her forehead wrinkled. "Why?" 

"Well," Jason said, jumping down from his bed, "I'm not as smart as Billy, but with your help, Trini, we can try and do something other than sit here." He looked at her with determination. "It's what Billy would want us to do while we wait for him to return."

Trini returned the expression and joined him in the doorway. In a heartbeat, Kimberly was beside them. "Three heads are better than one," she said with a grim smile.

_To be continued_

A/N: For Fae, like I promised. :-)


	13. Cracking the Code

Disclaimer: Power Rangers and all things related belong to Saban/Disney. If the Rangers go missing, it's not because I'm keeping them all to myself…promise!

**Impending Darkness**

Chapter Thirteen

_This is in all probability the same room Tommy described from the length of time he was under the control of the World-Burners,_ Billy thought to himself, a slight tingle of unease dancing down his spine. It was indeed round and white, with no other remarkable features. There were no obvious sensing devices or even windows, and the only interruption in the plain surface was the door. His memory was a blank, however, as to how he had come to be in this room. He had initiated his nocturnal rest at the same time as his companions; however, it failed to completely surprise him that he had not awakened with them.

The logical part of his brain had suspected all along that it was only a matter of time before they were each experimented upon again. He wished it wasn't like that, but without further data to disprove his hypothesis, that was all Billy was left with.

His thoughts were interrupted by the sound of the door opening. He quickly got to his feet and turned to face whatever opponent had been brought against him...and saw Azalea. She was slightly out of breath, and if the Blue Ranger wasn't mistaken, she looked exhausted. Distantly, he recorded that observation for examination later. Right now, he had to get out of there.

"Azalea," Billy began, moving toward the girl, but she made an abrupt silencing gesture and pointed to something behind him. She knelt suddenly, tucking her chin against her chest and pulling her black hair to one side, letting the back of her neck show. Billy turned quickly to see the image of a _Liame-Menashi_ standing behind him, it's hooded robe hiding its reptilian features.

_"Naiss saj." _The first word meant nothing to Billy, but he understood the last to be 'me'. Assuming a literal word-to-word translation...show me? Help me? _No, '_assis_' means help, _Billy thought.

Azalea began speaking quickly, head still bowed. Her eyes were closed, and everything about her was tense, as if she were ready to bolt.

The World-Burner listened, unmoving. When the little girl finished, it said nothing. Was it still listening? Or was it merely a projection as Tommy said, and needed outside commands to function? Perhaps it was a live transmission instead, instead of an automated image.

_"Shua ties sho suev sal." _The words were abrupt; Billy recognized the word 'you' but didn't know if the lizard-like alien was speaking to him or Azalea.

That dilemma was solved when the World-Burner closed the distance to Azalea's huddled form and struck her across the face. She fell over on her side and did not try to rise. Was it a futile action? Was she safer on the floor in her submissive position?

Billy belatedly moved to intervene, but he found himself frozen in place, much as Zack had described when he had been frozen to his bed. The hem of the World-Burner's robe twitched, and slowly its tail snaked into view. The alien flexed the powerful appendage once, where Azalea could see it.

The girl apparently knew exactly what the threatening gesture meant; she got to her feet and practically scampered to the door. She was gone with only the slightest parting look over her shoulder at Billy.

The Blue Ranger turned his attention back to the World-Burner, but just as silently as the creature had appeared, it evaporated. _Definitely a substantial hologram, like the screen in our living quarters._

Billy didn't understand—weren't they supposed to do something to him? Would he start hallucinating like Tommy? He clenched his hands into fists; he was anticipating something, theorizing without a complete set of data, and that frustrated him.

He took a deep breath and tried to calm his racing thoughts. Billy pondered his next move; it was not often that he had unoccupied time to himself. Normally he would make notes about his newest discovery, tinker with the interface, or work through his suppositions with his teammates.

_Not having pen and paper is no reason to obstruct the path of science,_ he decided. He seated himself on the ground and wilfully ignored the anxiety attempting to build inside him. _My companions are depending upon me. Anything I can come up with may be useful later. Together we will solve these problems, of that I __**can**__ be certain._

"This symbol occurs here, here, and here," Trini said, pointing to a particular character. Kimberly rubbed her eyes sleepily; she felt as if she'd been staring at the computer interface for hours. "It's probably not a vowel, but a frequently-used consonant."

Kim cast a sideways glance at Jason, but he was busily writing the phrase Trini had indicated down. It was one of several reoccurring passages that kept popping up on the interface, in the section where the alien text kept streaming by. They hadn't found a way to pause the moving characters, so they had put up with it as best they could.

Billy had begun to notate all the different symbols he had seen on the interface, treating them as if they were letters in a cryptogram to be decoded. His analysis of the numbering system was as complete as could be; it was a ten-digit system just like the Rangers were used to. What was left, however, was the real puzzle.

As far as the three of them could tell, the alien alphabet had twenty-three distinct letters. The difficulty, however, was that some of the letters often appeared to have extra dots above and below; they didn't know what the significance of that was yet. Trini's guess was pronunciation related, but Kimberly thought it might be emphasis. Jason, who didn't come from another country and had only visited Canada in terms of international travel, really had no reference to come up with his own theory.

For now, however, they had decided to ignore the dots and work from the words Billy had written down. Even that wasn't much; most of the communication they'd had with Azalea had been in the form of pictures and gestures. Jason was reasonably confident they had 'a', 's', and 'i' figured out; those were the primary letters used in most of the World Burner language. Guessing at all the symbols that went in between, however, was proving to be more of a challenge.

Finally, Kimberly decided that she was going to go blind from staring at the screen, and possibly even partially brain-dead from exhaustion. She stood to stretch, and teetered off-balance for a moment as the blood rushed to her head.

"You okay?" Trini asked, glancing up over her shoulder at her best friend.

"Yeah," Kimberly replied. "I'm just tired…I'm going to catch a nap before Zack and Tommy wake up."

"All right," Trini said with a small, tired smile of her own. "Maybe we'll have cracked this stuff by the time you get up."

"I hope so," Kimberly said with a sigh, before disappearing into the sleeping quarters.

Jason also took a moment to stretch, and as he did, his stomach rumbled hungrily. "It's not too early for breakfast, is it?" he asked Trini, who just rolled her eyes in amusement. He got up and started hunting through the kitchen half of the room for a sphere with cereal or something similar inside. "Do you want something?" he asked as an afterthought.

"Sure, a cup of juice," the Yellow Ranger replied, picking up a fresh sheet of paper and idly beginning to jot some words down.

Jason found a glass and filled it up as requested. This he delivered to Trini while experimentally shaking one of the meal-bubbles in his other hand. "Does that sound like cereal to you?" he asked.

Trini paused and listened to the rattle from the plastic sphere. "I'd say Fruit Loops." She took a long sip of her juice and turned back to the screen, contemplating it silently.

"Hm. I was hoping for Lucky Charms," Jason said more to himself than to her, but he opened the sphere anyway. The contents were indeed cereal; Honey Nut Cheerios, which were almost as good, in his opinion. _Bingo,_ Jason thought, hunting for a spoon before adding milk. He took Kimberly's vacated seat beside Trini. "What are you thinking?" he eventually asked into the silence that stretched between them.

The Asian girl paused, her lips pressing into a thin line. "I think that I'm worried about Billy." She looked at him. "Jason, he's the best one out of all of us to work on this translation. Sometimes I feel like I'm just guessing. _Billy's _the brilliant one, but sometimes I think he's more vulnerable to fear than any of the rest of us."

Jason set down his breakfast and faced Trini squarely. "Zordon chose him too, Trini. Never forget that. Billy is the Blue Ranger because he is worthy of the Power given to him. He has the strength and the will to be a Power Ranger the same as you. I don't doubt that he's just as afraid as any of us right now, but," Jason reached over and squeezed his friend's shoulder, "he'll get through. We all will."

Trini gazed back at him, tears standing in her almond-shaped eyes. "Thanks, Jase," she said quietly after a moment. She looked down at the pages of alien language arrayed in front of her. "I just needed a little boost, that's all."

As if on cue, the familiar sound of the outer airlock cycling reached their ears. A sense of foreboding swept over Jason as he jumped to his feet and took a defensive stance. He was about to have Trini run and wake the others in case it was the World-Burners returning, but by that time the inner lock was cycling. The door irised open to reveal Azalea. There was no sign of Billy, and Jason felt Trini stiffen beside him, then slump just as quickly.

Azalea took in Jason and Trini crouched in front of the computer interface without so much as blinking. For a moment, the Red Ranger felt as if he had been caught doing something wrong, but the alien girl didn't seem inclined to object. He wondered if she already knew that they wouldn't be able to access anything from the interface without her help. Jason was abruptly reminded of the Sylvi and decided that he didn't want to bring that back to Azalea's memory. Not if they were going to successfully convince her that the Rangers were different, that they weren't going to trick her.

Trini appeared to be having the same thoughts, for instead of turning back to the screen, she set down her page of notes and stood up, empty orange juice glass in hand. "Good morning," she greeted Azalea with a smile. "Are you feeling better?" She pointed to Azalea and mimed being sick, ending with passing out.

Although Azalea wouldn't have known about the fight that had occurred when the World-Burners had come for her, she looked chagrined. _"Hasi,"_ she replied to Trini with a small nod. _"Sei Liame-Menashi sahi sho desi saj morasmi. Jas asi suto lis aylas avi."_ She said it all with an indifferent tone and a shrug, but Jason read her posture and guessed that she had been punished from the hunch of her shoulders and the stiff way she moved into the room.

Trini wasn't able to translate what Azalea had said completely; she knew it had been about the World-Burners...maybe they still wanted to take care of Azalea if for no other reason than they needed her to interact with their test subjects? She shook her head slightly at Jason when he looked at her for a translation.

Azalea came closer and appeared to look the Yellow Ranger up and down. "_Komas asia sal?"_ she asked. "_Shasa sal menasma sein?"_ She gestured to the half-eaten container of cereal Jason held and then to the cupboards before looking pointedly back at Trini.

At that, Jason had to squelch a laugh. Clearly, Azalea thought it was high time Trini got herself back onto solid food instead of intravenous substances. _So much for being the only mother hen,_ he thought, taking another couple bites of cereal as Trini tried and failed to come up with a response that Azalea would understand.

Trini, for her part, wasn't sure if she could find something that her system could tolerate without opening a bunch of the meal bubbles. Of course, if push came to shove, she could probably count on the guys to handle disposing of whatever it was she did turn up. "All right," she said resignedly. "Come on, you can help."

_"Hasi,"_ Azalea agreed. By standing on her toes, she was able to slide one of the cupboard doors open fully. She pointed to one particular section of bubbles. _"Sun im sosh."_ Trini got down two and handed both to Azalea. The little girl took one and scrutinized the alien script on the side. "Kh-amp-bel-l's kh-hic-kh-en noodle s-soup," she read aloud slowly. _"Sei _s-soup _dise asi hasi, jas issai."_

Trini's mouth dropped open. Jason's did, too. Azalea, heedless of the reaction she'd just caused, picked up the second bubble and tried, "Kh-amp-b-bell's min-eh-str-o-nee soup." She shrugged her shoulders, obviously not caring which one Trini tried, as long as she ate. Then Azalea happened to look up at Trini's dumbstruck expression, and she froze, eyes widening in fear.

Trini, however, wasn't paying any attention. "Jason-!" she exclaimed, but needn't have bothered. Jason had already snatched up the paper with all the symbols Billy had noted down and vaulted over the back of the chair he'd been sitting in.

Azalea dove out of the way as the two Rangers put their heads together and began referencing the script on the container to Billy's notes.

"Look, there's the 'h'...and the 'i', we had that right."

"'Campbell's' on the container only has one 'l'...wait! The dots must mean double letters! It happens again with the 'o' in 'noodle'."

In less than a minute, the two of them had written down every letter on the first bubble before reaching for the other one. By the time they were finished, Azalea had dared to venture back over to the other side of the counter, her eyes just level with the tabletop. She seemed to accept that whatever emotion Jason and Trini were expressing was not negative and also not directed at her.

Eventually, the two Rangers sat back and studied their work. "I'm not sure that there's the same distinction between 'c' and 'k'," Trini said after a moment. She glanced at Jason. "Did you ever study phonics?"

Jason shook his head. "Nope. You're thinking that the aliens just did a..." he fished for the term, couldn't find it, "...direct translation?"

"Yes," Trini answered, with a significant glance in Azalea's direction. "You heard how Azalea pronounced 'chicken'-with the 'c' and the 'h' separately. Now, we've never heard her use the 'ch' sound, so what she was reading was just the sounds the symbols mean to her. If we ask her what these symbols sound like," and Trini tapped the few unlabeled characters that were left on their sheet, "we'll know what we're missing."

Jason nodded, and gestured for Trini to try it. The Asian girl circled back around to the sitting area and settled herself down so that she was on Azalea's level. The small alien girl watched her go, obviously trying to decide whether or not to keep her attention on Jason or Trini. In the end, Trini won when she called Azalea over.

"Can you say this for me?" the Yellow Ranger asked, pointing to a symbol with two curlicues. "Um..._saet,_ _pasfavas?"_

"Vv," Azalea said clearly. "_Deas_ _**v**__as si __**v**__oss_."

"That's the 'v'," Trini mutterd, noting it down. She went to the next character that looked something like half of an backwards 'c'. "This one?"

"Dh," Azalea said after looking at it a moment. _"Deas '__**d**__eas'."_

In the next few minutes, Trini managed to get Azalea to sound out each of the missing characters. "This is great," she said excitedly to Jason as she made one last note. "I mean, the different 'c' sounds are going to throw us off in terms of what we've heard said and how it reads off of the screen, but..." she paused, turning in her seat to see the pensive look on Jason's face for the first time. "What is it, Jason?"

He turned his back to the counter and leaned against it, crossing his arms as he thought. "Why label them in a language we can't understand, but Azalea can read?"

Trini's momentary elation dimmed as she considered the question. She tapped her pencil against her cheekbone as she thought. "Maybe for the same reason this door was locked when we first woke up here? We had said that this room wasn't ready yet; what if the aliens cut corners by not providing the English translation? What if it was meant to be like the syringes that had alien numbers _and_ our numbers, but they just ran out of time? Maybe we woke up too soon."

"They keep underestimating us," Jason mused. "That's a good thing." His mind was already attempting to strategize the next best thing to do with their cracking of the alien alphabet. "That might buy us some time, Trini."

"Time?" she repeated. "Jason, if anything we're in even more danger. The World Burners are just going to keep torturing us, taking us away, and eventually they're going to succeed and-and-"

"Woah, slow down. We're not going to let that happen," the Red Ranger broke in before Trini could really work herself up again. He waited for her to nod, however reluctantly before forging ahead. "Okay, I want to try something," Jason said, straightening up. "Azalea, _Anassa_ and _Dysi_." He pronounced the names exactly as he had heard them in the memory. "Do you know them?"

If he'd wanted Azalea's attention before, Jason couldn't have found a better way to capture it. Perched on the edge of a chair, she was staring at him so hard that she wasn't blinking. Then something happened, something so un-Azalea-ish that Jason and Trini nearly backed away from her. She began to cry.

As soon as the first tears fell, Azalea gasped in horror and tried to scrub them away with her hands. Then her sobs overtook her and all she could do was cover her face and shake. _"San, san," _she said, her tone mortified. _"Lemmas. Jas asi lemmas."_

Jason and Trini exchanged awkward glances. "It is all right, Azalea," Trini began, leaving her seat to kneel beside Azalea's chair. "We want to help you." As the small girl continued to try and get her emotions under control, Trini carefully put an arm around her shoulders. Azalea stiffened as if she'd turned into a statue. She appeared to be holding her breath, waiting for something to happen. When nothing did, Azalea turned to look at Trini.

"H-help? _Sal desia assis saj?"_ Her disbelief was apparent on her face without Trini needing to translate the question. But there was something else in her eyes...belief? Did she really think that they could do it?

"Yes, help. We want to escape from the _Liame-Menashi_ and we will take you with us," Jason said firmly. "But if we're going to get out of here, you've got to help us." He pointed at the round screen before turning back to her. "Azalea, we know you've been hurt, but we're different. We can do this _together."_

He wasn't sure if she had understood everything he was trying to communicate, but he had to try. Azalea could...feel them somehow. Jason was convinced, from her own memory, that right now the alien girl could feel the sincerity from both of the Rangers.

Azalea sucked in a tremulous breath and peered at the interface for several long moments before looking at Jason and Trini in turn. Tear tracks were fresh on her face as she said with a slow nod, _"Hasi."_ She sat forward and reached for a sheet of paper and a pencil. As she did so, Trini moved to pull the screen closer and her forearm accidentally brushed against Azalea's hand.

As cleanly as if it had been done with a scalpel, a three-inch gash appeared on the Yellow Ranger's arm. It was so sudden that all Trini could do was stare at the cut in shock. Azalea jumped away from her, horror and shame on her face, and the paper in her hand fell to the floor, forgotten. She backed away from the pair, her words running together as she...apologized? Explained? Neither Ranger was sure; the torrent was too fast to translate.

_"San. Jas asi lemmas, _Trini._ Sal lisea'a jas sho ties assis sal. Jas sho ties tous sal, jas asi san. Lemmas!"_

Azalea had backed right up to the door, almost throwing herself against it in her haste to get out of the room. Jason and Trini stared after her in stunned silence.

Trini recovered first as blood welled up from the gash. She jumped up and ran into the sleeping area, snatched a cloth from inside the nearest bathroom and pressed it against the wound. Turning back to the living room, saw the silhouette of Jason standing in the doorway. His shoulders slumped and Trini knew exactly what that meant.

"Now what?" she muttered to herself.

_To be continued_

Language Translations:

_Naiss saj: Tell me._

_Shua ties sho suev sal: We cannot sense you._

_Hasi: Yes/okay._

_Sei Liame-Menashi sahi sho desi saj morasmi. Jas asi suto lis aylas avi: The Fire-Eaters do not want me dead. I am better to them alive._

_Komas asia sal? Shasa sal menasma sein: How are you? Have you eaten yet?_

_Sun im sosh: One of those._

_Sei _soup _dise asi hasi, jas issai: The soup will be okay, I think._

_Um...saet,_ _pasfavas: Um...say, please._

_Deas_ _**v**__as si __**v**__oss_: _Like on and off._

_Deas 'deas': Like 'like'._

_San, san: No, no._

_Lemmas. Jas asi lemmas: Sorry. I am sorry._

_Sal desia assis saj: You want to help me?_

_San. Jas asi lemmas, _Trini._ Sal lisea'a jas sho ties assis sal. Jas sho ties tous sal, jas asi san. Lemmas: No. I am sorry, Trini. You see I can't help you. I can't touch you, I am bad. Sorry._


End file.
